- Author: Katherine Lanca
- Editor: Danielle L. Lee
- Editor: Lorrene Ritchie
The University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources is calling academics, UC ANR staff, and students to attend the kickoff of their 2025-2040 strategic visioning process at the UC ANR Statewide Conference on April 24-27, 2023 in Fresno, California. Topics of the conference include: healthy food systems, healthy environments, healthy communities, and healthy Californians. Nutrition Policy Institute researchers will attend the conference to share current challenges, best practices, and future opportunities pertaining to healthy food access and nutrition policy in California and nationally. NPI team members will also lead sessions on professional development and best research practices. In addition to presenting, NPI will have an interactive table in the UC ANR Resources Room where NPI team members can answer attendees' questions about NPI and the CalFresh Health Living Evaluation Unit. A list of the poster presentations and sessions led by NPI researchers is found below.
Community Nutrition
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Sharing Successes and Collaborations in Community Nutrition and Health
Session: Measuring outcomes of CalFresh Healthy Living: Collaborating to enhance evaluation rigor and apply an equity framework
Presenters: Kaela Plank, Miranda Westfall, and Barbara MkNelly
Monday, April 24, 2023, 11:00 a.m.- 12 p.m.
Drinking Water
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Enabling Consumption of Water: the Example of Schools
Session: What's New in the World of Water?
Presenter: Christina Hecht
Tuesday, April 25, 2023, 3:30 p.m.-5:00 p.m.
Nutrition Security
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Research to Inform Policy: Nutrition Security and Health Equity
Session: Food Systems: Healthy Planet, Healthy People
Presenter: Lorrene Ritchie
Tuesday, April 25, 2023, 8:00 a.m.- 10:00 a.m.
Professional Development and Research Skills
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Wheel of your Career
Session: Food Systems: Healthy Planet, Healthy People
Presenter: Danielle Lee
Wednesday, April 26, 2023, 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m.
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From Science to Action: Tools and Techniques for Fact-Based Civic Engagement
Session: Strengthening Participatory Extension Approaches
Presenter: Christina Hecht
Thursday, April 27, 2023, 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
School Food
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Universal School Meals in California: Challenges and Benefits Reported by Foodservice Directors and Parents
Poster: M-55
Presenter: Lorrene Ritchie
Monday, April 24, 2023, 6:30 p.m.- 8:30 p.m.
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Method for Evaluating Food Packaging Waste in Schools: Waste Audit for Sustainable Transitions and Evaluations (WASTE)
Poster: T-30
Presenter: Danielle Lee
Tuesday, April 25, 2023, 6:30 p.m.- 8:30 p.m.
Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)
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Highlighting the impact of multi-state research-to-policy efforts during COVID-19: understanding perspectives and utilization of WIC adaptations in California and beyond
Poster: M-64
Presenter: Lorrene Ritchie, Danielle Lee, and Marisa Tsai
Monday, April 24, 2023, 6:30 p.m.- 8:30 p.m.
- Author: Katherine Lanca
- Editor: Danielle L. Lee
- Editor: Lorrene Ritchie
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) food packages provide a specific set of foods to meet nutritional needs of low-income pregnant, breastfeeding, and postpartum individuals, infants, and children up to age 5 who are at nutritional risk. The USDA's proposed revisions include increasing the value of WIC's fruit and vegetable benefit, flexibility in food package sizes, and closer alignment with the current Dietary Guidelines of America, 2020-2025. A new research brief highlights WIC participants' preferences for recommended changes to the WIC food package. Among nearly 8,000 WIC participants from 12 States that responded to an open-ended survey question in 2021 about their experiences with WIC, there was a common desire for greater flexibility and personalization of the WIC food packages. Participants expressed an interest in purchasing more fruits and vegetables and highlighted inadequacy of the current CVB amount to meet their dietary preferences and needs. The research offers WIC participants' input to develop WIC food packages that improve participants' health outcomes, and addresses inequitable access to nutritious foods. The USDA, Food and Nutrition Service, invites public comment on WIC food package revisions on the Federal Register by February 21, 2023. The research brief was developed by Gabby Underwood and Loan Kim of Pepperdine University, Danielle Lee and Lorrene Ritchie of the Nutrition Policy Institute, and Christina Chauvenet of the National WIC Association.
- Author: Katherine Lanca
- Editor: Danielle L. Lee
- Editor: Lorrene Ritchie
Licensed family child care homes (FCCH) provide child care in individual homes, are often located in the same neighborhood as the families they serve and often provide longer hours of care at a lower cost than child care centers. New research shows that a self-paced, online nutrition training for FCCH providers has the potential to make childhood nutrition guidance more accessible and may help bridge a potential regulatory gap: licensed FCCHs in California not currently participating in the federal Child and Adult Care Food Program only receive one hour of mandatory nutrition training if licensed after 2016—leaving out nearly 30,000 providers licensed before 2016 who provide care to over 310,000 children—and are not required to offer foods and beverages that meet nutrition standards. The training—available in both English and Spanish and free of cost to California-based providers—consists of four 20-minute interactive models providing guidance on what and how to feed infants and toddlers. Child care providers reported high levels of satisfaction, as well as an intention to make changes in feeding practices, after completing a pilot-test of the online training. Findings also identified a need for culturally relevant information and a live nutrition educator to discuss the training material. The research article was published in the California Agriculture journal and authored by Danielle Lee, Ron Strochlic, and Lorrene Ritchie from the Nutrition Policy Institute, Deepa Srivastava and Marisa Neelon from the University of California's Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and Abbey Alkon and Victoria Keeton from UC, San Francisco and the California Childcare Health Program. The project was funded by a grant from UC ANR.
- Author: Katherine Lanca
- Editor: Danielle L. Lee
- Editor: Lorrene Ritchie
Healthy default beverage laws require restaurants to list healthier beverages—such as water or unflavored milk as opposed to sugary drinks—as the default option for children's meals. These laws intend to address unhealthy beverage consumption by young children, directing consumers toward healthier beverage choices at no additional cost. New research evaluates the adherence of children's meals to healthy default beverage laws from online restaurant meal ordering platforms available in Los Angeles, Baltimore, and New York City. Among over 100 of the top-grossing restaurant chains sampled, fewer than 3% of online children meal orders in any jurisdiction adhered to the strictest interpretation of the healthy default beverage laws. Varying adherence to healthy default beverage laws by jurisdiction was found and may be attributable to differing definitions of a healthy beverage. For example, California's law considers non-flavored milk and water as healthy default beverage options, while Baltimore and New York laws also allow 100% juice and flavored milk. Policy can be optimized by clearly defining healthy beverages, bundled children's meals, and what constitutes adherence to the law for online ordering platforms. The study, published in the American Journal of Preventative Medicine, was conducted by Daniel Zaltz and Sara Benjamin-Neelson of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Danielle Lee, Gail Woodward-Lopez, and Lorrene Ritchie of the Nutrition Policy Institute, and Sara Bleich of Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health with partial support from a grant from the National Institutes of Health (no. T32DK062707).
The federal Child and Adult Care Food Program provides reimbursements for nutritious meals and snacks for over 4.2 million children in the US at participating child care sites. Nutrition Policy Institute researchers collaborated with the CACFP Roundtable to identify benefits of and barriers to participating in the CACFP by independent child care centers and their sponsors. Nearly one-in-three child care centers participating in CACFP across the nation are considered independent centers, meaning they are independently owned and operated, not owned by a corporation and operate at a single physical site. Through focus groups and interviews conducted with 16 independent centers and 5 sponsors of independent centers in California, December 2021 through March 2022, researchers identified several benefits of and barriers to CACFP participation as well several facilitators to support participation. The study also highlighted the important role sponsors play in supporting independent centers to participate in the CACFP. The participating centers and sponsors were geographically diverse, located across all California Department of Social Services-established CACFP administrative regions, from both rural and non-rural settings. Length of CACFP-participation ranged from one to 10 or more years, and one tribal and one government/military independent center also participated in the study. Findings were published in an article in the journal Nutrients as well as a research brief. The study was conducted by Lorrene Ritchie, Danielle Lee, and Christina Hecht from NPI, in collaboration with Elyse Homel Vitale and Samantha Marshall from the CACFP Roundtable, and Lindsay Beck from the University of California, San Francisco, Nutrition & Food Services. The study was funded by the California Department of Social Services.