California leads the way in healthy school meals

May 10, 2024

By Farms.com

A visit by U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and California First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom to a Los Angeles school showcased California's successful child nutrition programs. Farm to School and Universal Meals initiatives were the focus, highlighting California's commitment to student health and local agriculture.

The visit coincided with the recent implementation of new, science-based school meal nutrition standards by the USDA. Both Secretary Vilsack and First Partner Newsom commended California's efforts to provide healthy meals for all students while supporting local farmers.

California has taken significant steps in child nutrition. They were a frontrunner in implementing universal school meals, expanding access to existing federal programs. Additionally, their Farm to School program connects schools with local farms, providing fresh produce to over 1.5 million students.

California's ambitious goals are to increase the use of local ingredients in school meals and integrate food education. It also details partnerships between the USDA and California to strengthen local agriculture and address summer hunger among students.

Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

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