Obama Administration Launches Healthy

A number of factors have contributed, including habits and patterns in family life and community infrastructures that deter physical activity and increase the consumption of processed or fast foods. And although obesity among children and young people stretches beyond socioeconomic borders, poorer communities are often the hardest hit. These low-income areas, often referred to as “food deserts,” are typically populated with fast food restaurants and convenience stores that offer little or no healthy food choices—a situation the Obama administration hopes to rectify with its Healthy Food Financing Initiative.

The $400 million a year initiative, launched in Philadelphia on Friday by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, aims to expand access to fresh, healthy food to all underserved urban and rural communities across the country within seven years, creating jobs in the process. “The Healthy Food Financing Initiative will enhance access to healthy and affordable choices in struggling urban and rural communities, create jobs and economic development, and establish market opportunities for farmers and ranchers,” Vilsack said, noting that the effort is a “critically important step” toward the First Lady’s goal of solving the childhood obesity epidemic within a generation by not only making healthy foods more affordable and accessible for families, but increasing understanding of nutrition, improving the quality of food in schools, and promoting exercise.

Secretary Geithner explained that the program, a partnership between the U.S. Departments of Treasury, Agriculture and Health and Human Services, will be a mixture of $250 million in tax credits to encourage food retailers to build grocery stores in poor communities and some $150 million in low-rate loans and grants to help smaller outlets like convenience stores and bodegas carry healthier food options. The USDA has created a Food Atlas, which shows where the underserved communities are located. “It’s been a tough year for America, but for our middle class and distressed communities it’s been a tough decade,” Geithner said. “We’re here to make sure that in America, where a child grows up doesn’t determine whether they have access to a better, healthier future. By introducing powerful incentives for private investors to take a chance on projects, like a new, healthier grocery store, we can make that difference for America’s children, while creating new jobs and services in their communities.”