By Associated Press
Last updated at 12:25 PM on 16th November 2011

Pizza is set to be classified as a vegetable for the purposes of school lunches – because it contains tomato paste.

A congressional committee is pushing for the move and to keep french fries on school lunch lines in a fightback against an Obama administration proposal to make school lunches healthier.

The final version of a spending bill released late Monday would unravel school lunch standards the Agriculture Department proposed earlier this year which limits the use of potatoes and delays limits on sodium and a requirement to boost whole grains.

The bill also would allow tomato paste on pizzas to be counted as a vegetable.

Guideline reversal: A spending bill released late Monday reverses previous school lunch standards proposed by the Agriculture Department limiting the use of potatoes and allowing tomato paste on pizzas to be counted as a vegetable

Food companies that produce frozen pizzas for schools, the salt industry and potato growers requested the changes, and some conservatives in Congress say the federal government shouldn’t be telling children what to eat.

Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee said the changes would ‘prevent overly burdensome and costly regulations and to provide greater flexibility for local school districts to improve the nutritional quality of meals.’

Pro veggies: First Lady Michelle Obama has made healthy eating a top issue for her, promoting a balanced meal with plenty of vegetables to young children which some feel may slouch with Congress’ new guidelines

School districts had said some of the USDA requirements went too far and cost too much when budgets are extremely tight.

Schools have long taken broad instructions from the government on what they can serve in federally subsidized meals that are served free or at reduced price to low-income children.

But some schools have balked at government attempts to tell them exactly what foods they can’t serve.

Fighting for fries: The Senate voted last month to block limiting potato in their version of healthy school lunches

Reacting to that criticism, House Republicans had urged USDA to completely rewrite the standards in their version of the bill passed in June.

The Senate last month voted to block the potato limits in their version.

Neither version included the language on tomato paste, sodium or whole grains, which was added by House-Senate negotiators on the bill.

The school lunch proposal was based on 2009 recommendations by the Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said they were needed to reduce childhood obesity and future health care costs.

Nutrition advocate Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest said Congress’s proposed changes will keep schools from serving a wider array of vegetables.

Children already get enough pizza and potatoes, she says.

Garden education: Mrs Obama, who has invited local school children to help with the White House’s garden, has pushed for healthier school lunches while some school districts have said the USDA requirements have gone too far and cost too much

It would also slow efforts to make pizzas — a longtime standby on school lunch lines — healthier, with whole grain crusts and lower levels of sodium.

‘They are making sure that two of the biggest problems in the school lunch program, pizza and french fries, are untouched,’ she said.

A group of retired generals advocating for healthier school lunches also criticized the spending bill.

The group, called Mission: Readiness has called poor nutrition in school lunches a national security issue because obesity is the leading medical disqualifier for military service.

‘We are outraged that Congress is seriously considering language that would effectively categorize pizza as a vegetable in the school lunch program,’ Amy Dawson Taggart, the director of the group, said in a letter to members of Congress before the final plan was released.

Issue of National Security: Indiana Senator Richard Lugar called on Congress to pass Mission: Readiness, which says poor nutrition in school lunches is a national security issue because obesity is the leading medical disqualifier for military service

‘It doesn’t take an advanced degree in nutrition to call this a national disgrace.’

Specifically, the provisions would:

• Block the Agriculture Department from limiting starchy vegetables, including corn and peas, to two servings a week. The rule was intended to cut down on french fries, which some schools serve daily.

• Allow USDA to count two tablespoons of tomato paste as a vegetable, as it does now. The department had attempted to require that only a half-cup of tomato paste could be considered a vegetable — too much to put on a pizza. Federally subsidized lunches must have a certain number of vegetables to be served.

• Require further study on long-term sodium reduction requirements set forth by the USDA guidelines.

• Require USDA to define ‘whole grains’ before they regulate them. The rules would require schools to use more whole grains.
Food companies who have fought the USDA standards say they were too strict and neglected the nutrients that potatoes, other starchy vegetables and tomato paste do offer.

‘This agreement ensures that nutrient-rich vegetables such as potatoes, corn and peas will remain part of a balanced, healthy diet in federally funded school meals and recognizes the significant amounts of potassium, fiber and vitamins A and C provided by tomato paste, ensuring that students may continue to enjoy healthy meals such as pizza and pasta,’ said Kraig Naasz, president of the American Frozen Food Institute.

The school lunch provisions are part of a final House-Senate compromise on a $182 billion measure would fund the day-to-day operations of the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development.

Both the House and the Senate are expected to vote on the bill this week and send it to President Barack Obama.

From DailyMail – click here.

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Import of fresh vegetables are being banned across the European countries.

Will sales of frozen vegetables be on the rise?

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Food Costs Seen Reaching Record as Global Inflation Accelerates

April 26 (Bloomberg) — Global food prices may rise 4.4 percent to a record by the end of the year, driven by demand for meat, oilseeds and grains used to make ethanol, adding to costs that mean inflation is accelerating from the U.S. to China.

The United Nations’ Food Price Index may climb to 240 points from 229.84 last month, said William Adams, a fund manager at Zurich-based Resilience AG, which has $22.2 million of assets. Global corn stockpiles are shrinking the most in seven years, inventories of nine edible oils will drop to the lowest since 1974 and U.S. beef stocks will be the smallest since 1999, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates.

“The stockpiles are being severely depleted,” said Adams, who correctly forecast gains in heating oil and gasoline prices last year. “Eventually it gets to the consumer. The U.S. government isn’t subsidizing pork chops like it is ethanol.”

The cost of living in the U.S. rose at its fastest pace since December 2009 in the 12 months ended in March. Chinese consumer prices rose last month by the most since 2008. The People’s Bank of China raised borrowing costs four times since October and the European Central Bank increased rates on April 7 for the first time since 2008. World Bank President Robert Zoellick said April 16 that the world is “one shock away” from a crisis in food supply and prices.

Price Report

The UN’s food-price index, which covers 55 commodities, reached an all-time high of 236.8 points in February, before dropping by about 3 percent in March. The next report is scheduled for May 5.

Costlier food contributed to riots across northern Africa and the Middle East that toppled leaders in Egypt and Tunisia. It also drove 44 million people into poverty in the past year and another 10 million may join them should the UN index rise another 10 percent, the World Bank said April 16. Consumers should get used to paying more because farmers will take years to expand production enough to meet demand, the International Monetary Fund said in a first-quarter report.

Wheat traded on the Chicago Board of Trade, a global benchmark, jumped 75 percent in the past 12 months, soybeans gained 38 percent and corn more than doubled. U.S. wholesale beef prices are up 13 percent this year and pork costs 22 percent more, USDA data show.

While the gains increase costs for consumers they also mean U.S. farmers, the world’s biggest agricultural exporters, will earn a record $94.7 billion this year, the USDA estimates. North Dakota, the largest wheat-growing state, has a jobless rate of 3.6 percent, the lowest of any state.

‘Their Moment’

“There are not a lot of opportunities like this for farmers,” Adams said. “Raw materials are actually at a premium, so this is their moment.”

U.S. Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Janet Yellen said April 11 that higher food and fuel costs will have only a temporary impact on inflation and the gains do not warrant a reversal of record monetary stimulus.

The use of some crops is also gaining because of demand for alternative fuels after oil traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose 33 percent in the past year. Denatured ethanol, which contains additives to make it unfit for human consumption, rose 65 percent on the CBOT over the same period.

Demand for U.S. corn from ethanol producers including Archer Daniels Midlands Co. will rise 9.5 percent to 5 billion bushels this year, equal to 40 percent of the national crop, USDA data show. U.S. lawmakers introduced legislation last month to scrap a 45-cent-a-gallon tax credit for producers.

‘Minor’ Factor

“Biofuels, including ethanol, are a factor, but a relatively minor one” in food costs, Michael Baroni, vice president of economic policy at Decatur, Illinois-based ADM, said in an e-mail.

U.S. ethanol makers use 3 percent of global grain supply and produce 38 million metric tons of distillers grain and gluten used in animal feed, according to the Washington-based Renewable Fuels Association, which represents the industry.

U.S. corn stockpiles will fall to 675 million bushels by Aug. 31, from 1.7 billion bushels, the USDA estimates.

“Ethanol producers may be confronted with a squeeze on corn supplies during the late summer months,” F.O. Licht, a commodity researcher based in Ratzeburg, Germany, said in a report this month.

To contact the reporter on this story: Tony C. Dreibus in London at tdreibus@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Claudia Carpenter at ccarpenter2@bloomberg.net

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It was Dan White who used the Twinkie Defense in his murder trial of Mayor George Mascone and supervisor Harvey Milk.

Today it is a diet! Yes, Professor Dr. Mark Haub a nutritionist at Kansas State University wanted to prove a point. It’s all about calories, they are the only thing that matters.

To prove his point he went on a diet of Twinkies and other junk food items like Doritos chips, sugary cereals and Oreos. The key point was limiting his caloric intake to 1800 calories per day (previous to the diet his normal intake was 2600 calories per day).

In two months he lost a total of 27 pounds and that is not all; his body fat index went from 28.8 to 24.9, his good cholesterol increased by 20 percent, his bad cholesterol dropped by 20 percent, and his triglycerides dropped by 39 percent.

What does it all prove? I guess that caloric intake is the key and not necessarily the nutritional value of the food.

And you can go to WEBMD to get their take on the diet, click here.

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