Nutrition and physical activity news digest.

Can a National Food Day Convince Americans to Start Eating Right?
The Atlantic
September 15, 2011
In essence, Food Day is the "Stone Soup" of the food movement: Center for Science in the Public Interest puts the day out there, like a kettle with a stone in it, offering a chance to turn your carrot and my onion and her urban agriculture program and his hunger relief efforts into something remarkable. If groups and individuals organize thousands of Food Day events, big and small, we'll all start to understand not just that public health, sustainability, and food justice are related, but how they are related. It will help us begin to make changes in our own lives and our community's and country's institutions.

Why Americans can’t afford to eat healthy – The real reason Big Macs are cheaper than more nutritious alternatives? Government subsidies
Salon.com
Not surprisingly, the subsidies have manufactured a price inequality that helps junk food undersell nutritious-but-unsubsidized foodstuffs like fruits and vegetables. The end result is that recession-battered consumers are increasingly forced by economic circumstance to “choose” the lower-priced junk food that their taxes support. Corn — which is processed into the junk-food staple corn syrup and which feeds the livestock that produce meat — exemplifies the scheme. “Over the past decade, the federal government has poured more than $50 billion into the corn industry, keeping prices for the crop … artificially low,” reports Time magazine. “That’s why McDonald’s can sell you a Big Mac, fries and a Coke for around $5 — a bargain.”

Offer of soda-industry funds fell flat, as it should have
Philadelphia Inquirer
September 14, 2011
Discusses Philadelphia mayor’s rationale for rejecting funds from soda industry for an anti-obesity program. "It seems to me that accepting money from the beverage industry to fight obesity would be like taking money from the NRA to fight gun violence or from the tobacco industry for smoking cessations," Mayor Nutter said. "I mean, it's ludicrous."

Playground and Park Design: Getting Our Children to Exercise
The Atlantic
September 27, 2011
The current epidemic of obesity among our children and adolescents calls for creative, multidisciplinary approaches to address the problem. Improved nutrition at home, at school, and in the community is critical. Increased exercise is similarly important, but it is well known that the amount and quality of physical exercise declines as young children grow up and continues to decline into adulthood. A recent study looked at the types and amount of exercise that kids engaged in in public parks and offers some insights as to how to improve the physical activity levels of our youth through improved park planning.

Let's Make Let's Move! Even Better
The Atlantic
September 27, 2011
With plenty of room for more food access, farmers' markets continue to provide the most inexpensive, culturally sensitive, and effective option to get fresh produce into America's seriously underserved urban and rural communities. These markets provide jobs and fertile ground for inventive, entrepreneurial approaches to launching food businesses that require low investment -- and can have high impact, creating new jobs and equity opportunities to low-wage workers.

Harvard plate v. USDA MyPlate: an improvement?
Food Politics by Marion Nestle
September 15, 2011
Harvard School of Public Health students adapted the USDA MyPlate to offer more specific guidelines for healthful eating.