Nutrition Policy Institute researchers will present their collaborative research findings at the Society for Nutrition Education and Behavior International Annual 2023 Conference in Washington, D.C. Wendi Gosliner presents on July 22, 9:45 a.m. to 11:15 a.m. ET as part of a session on "School Meals for All: Exploring Global Initiatives and Lessons Learned from California and Maine." Lorrene Ritchie presents a poster on July 23, 10:15 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. ET titled "Transition to Freshly-Prepared School Meals: Impacts on Meal Appeal, Student Participation, Intake, Food and Packaging Waste & School Finances;" the poster is co-authored by Celeste Felix and Danielle Lee from NPI, Hannah Thompson, Kristine Madsen and Caroline Nguyen from the University of California, Berkeley, and Laura Vollmer from UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. Miranda Westfall presents a poster on July 23, 10:15 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. ET titled "Assessments of Practices to Support Nutrition and Physical Activity at CA SNAP-Ed Eligible Schools Reveal Inequities;" the poster is co-authored by Janice Kao, Carolyn Rider, Sridharshi Hewawitharana, Amanda Linares, and Gail Woodward-Lopez from NPI.

Virtually all San Diego County CalFresh participants (known as SNAP nationwide) have been receiving monthly text messages in multiple languages encouraging them to eat more fruits and vegetables and directing them to a dedicated multilingual website with more information. The County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency may be the first SNAP administering agency in the US to use text messages to share nutrition information and promote a healthy diet. This effort began in 2020 in partnership with the University of California, Nutrition Policy Institute and the UC San Diego Center for Community Health. Building on previous survey results, UC researchers conducted focus groups in English and Spanish with text message recipients to elicit their experience of the messages. CalFresh participants reported overwhelmingly positive perceptions of the effort, including increased fruit and vegetable intake, trying unfamiliar produce items, improved perceptions of CalFresh, and feelings that the agency cares about their health and well-being. Participants want the effort to continue with more frequent messages. Text messaging participants is a relatively low-cost approach that SNAP agencies can use to encourage diet improvement, optimization of food dollars, and to enhance perceptions of and experiences with SNAP. Focus group results were published in the journal Nutrients by Celeste Felix, Ron Strochlic, and Wendi Gosliner from the Nutrition Policy Institute, Blanca Melendrez and Shanna Wright from the UC San Diego Center for Community Health, and Hao Teng from Teachers College, Colombia University.

A new research brief developed by the Nutrition Policy Institute details findings from an evaluation of the California Nutrition Incentive Program, a program that provides CalFresh shoppers with a dollar-for-dollar match when purchasing California-grown produce at participating farmers markets and other retail outlets. In this evaluation, NPI researchers conducted surveys and interviews with a convenience sample of CalFresh shoppers and food store managers. Overall, CalFresh shoppers reported overwhelmingly positive experiences using CNIP and store managers also found the program to be beneficial. While the results showed that CNIP utilization did not have statistically significant impacts on quantitative measures of shoppers' produce intake or food security, shoppers did report that CNIP influenced the kinds of fruits and vegetables they bought and also attributed being able to buy more fruits and vegetables to this program. CalFresh shoppers wanted CNIP to continue and supported it expanding to other retail outlets.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), known as CalFresh in California, provides monthly electronic benefits for food purchases to over 40 million individuals with low incomes across the US. However, SNAP agencies do not typically provide  participants with information about food or nutrition. A pilot study was conducted to understand whether a CalFresh agency can send food and nutrition-based text messages, and if so, whether they can be effective. NPI researchers received a grant from the California Department of Food and Agriculture's Specialty Crop Block Grant Program to test the idea. In collaboration with UCSD, ideas42, and the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency, five monthly SMS text messages in English and Spanish were sent to over 170,000 SNAP households. Each text message contained a link to a website offering additional information on topics including the health benefits of different fruits and vegetables, cost-savings associated with seasonal produce, recipes and tips to reduce food waste. After 5 months, survey respondents showed a significant increase in knowledge about selecting, storing, and preparing fruits and vegetables. Over half of respondents self-reported purchasing and eating more California-grown fruits and vegetables at follow-up and nearly all respondents expressed interest in continuing to receive text messages. The findings suggest that text messages are a promising strategy to provide useful and relevant information on food and nutrition to SNAP participants. The research, published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, was conducted by Wendi Gosliner, Celeste Felix, Ron Strochlic, and Hannah Thompson from the Nutrition Policy Institute, University of California, Agriculture and Natural Resources; Shana Wright and Blanca Melendrez from the UC San Diego Center for Community Health; Allison Yates-Berg from ideas42; and Hao Tang from Colombia University. Funding for this project was made possible by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service through grant 19-0001-054. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the USDA. Additional funding was received from the National Institutes of Health grant UL1TR001442.