TEFAP Alliance Blog

Foodlinks America - September 1, 2006

In this issue:

· Expanded Food Donation Tax Credit Enacted
· Minimum Wage Raise Defeated in Tax Bill
· Poverty Rates Unchanged in 2005
· WIC Watch
· Food Stamp Facts
· Cranberries Coming, but Bonus Amounts Still Lagging
· Obesity Round-Up
· Community Food Projects Profile: Rebuilding a Sustainable Native Food System in the Desert
· Small Bites

Foodlinks America is published 24 times a year by California Emergency Foodlink in Sacramento, CA and distributed by Weinberg & Vauthier Consulting, 6412 CR 116, Burnet, TX 78611; Zy Weinberg and Barbara Vauthier, Editors; email: bvauthier@281.com.

Foodlinks America is not copyrighted, so the information can be freely shared with colleagues and friends, though attribution for reprinted articles is appreciated. For archived issues of Foodlinks America, go to: www.tefapalliance.org. To request a free subscription to the newsletter or to submit story ideas, contact Barbara Vauthier at: bvauthier@281.com.

Expanded Food Donation Tax Credit Enacted

Just before leaving town for its month-long August recess, Congress passed major portions of the Good Samaritan Hunger Relief Tax Incentive Act as part of a pension reform bill. The legislation allows farmers and small business owners to receive a tax deduction for food products contributed to food banks, food pantries, and homeless shelters. Until now, this deduction has been available only to large corporations.

The food donation law was included in the Pension Protection Act (H.R. 4) that passed the Senate on August 4. “I am excited that the Good Samaritan Act [has] finally become law,” said Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN), who had proposed similar legislation every year since 1999. President Bush signed the legislation on August 17, 2006 and it is now Public Law 109-280.

The tax incentive as enacted, however, will only be in effect for two years – for donations made between January 1, 2006 and December 31, 2007. Under the new law, donors will be able to deduct from their taxes the value of donated food equal to the basis of donated items plus one-half the fair market value, or two times the basis, whichever is less.

The legislation could not have come at a better time for food banks and other emergency feeding organizations who are struggling to keep up with increasing need in the face of declining donations. America’s Second Harvest, the national food bank network, estimates that the law will generate more than $250 million in new private sector food donations during the next two years.

Although the legislation will sunset at the end of next year, Senator Lugar has pledged to try to keep it in force beyond that deadline. “I will continue to work with my Senate colleagues to extend and expand this provision,” he said in an August 4, 2006 press statement.

Minimum Wage Raise Defeated in Tax Bill

Republican efforts to tie an increase in the minimum wage to a tax cut for the wealthy was defeated in the Senate on August 3, shortly before Congress left Washington for a month-long recess. A total of 57 Senators voted to end debate and bring the bill to the floor, but 60 votes were needed.

The bill, which would have significantly reduced estate taxes for the super-rich, included a provision to raise the minimum wage over three years to $7.25 an hour from the current $5.15. The minimum wage has been stuck at that level for nearly a decade, even though Congress has raised its own salary seven times since the last minimum wage increase.

“They’re holding the minimum wage and middle-class relief hostage, so they can repeal the estate tax,” said Harry Reid (D-NV), the Senate Minority Leader. Under the bill, “8,100 of the wealthy and well-off hit the jackpot, while millions of working families get $800 billion in [federal] debt,” Reid added. Democrats vowed to keep pushing for a minimum wage increase with no strings attached.

Poverty Rates Unchanged in 2005

Thirty-seven million Americans lived in poverty in 2005, according to data released by the U.S. Census Bureau on August 29, 2006. The national poverty rate of 12.6 percent remained unchanged from 2004. The highest poverty rates were found in Mississippi (21.3 percent), the District of Columbia (19.0 percent), New Mexico (18.5 percent), West Virginia (18.0 percent) and Texas (17.6 percent).

The Census Bureau reported a modest 1.1 percent gain in median income in 2005, though it was driven by a rise in income among elderly households. Median earnings for both male and female full-time workers declined in 2005, by 1.8 percent and 1.3 percent, respectively. Many below the poverty line were very poor; 43 percent of those in poverty had income of less than half the poverty threshold. Health coverage also shrank. The number of uninsured people increased by 1.3 million last year to a record 46.6 million.

“Families are struggling more to make ends meet to cover basic necessities such as food, housing, transportation, and health care,” noted the Food Research and Action Center in Washington, D.C. “Four years into an economic recovery, the country has yet to make progress in reducing poverty, raising the typical family’s income, or stemming the rise in the ranks of the uninsured,” commented Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in Washington, D.C.

And, “Developments so far in 2006 do not offer much cause for optimism,” Greenstein added. “Job growth has been slightly slower so far in 2006 than in 2005. In addition, in the first quarter of 2006, wages and salaries reached their lowest level on record as a share of the economy.”

For additional information and statistics, see the Census Bureau news release at:

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/income_wealth/007419.html.

WIC Watch

· Food package revisions proposed: For the first time in more than 25 years, foods provided to women and children in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC Program) are going to be adjusted. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) wants to change the traditional WIC emphasis on dairy products – including milk, cheese, and eggs – to provide more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.

“The WIC food package has not been revised or updated since 1980,” said Kate Coler, USDA deputy undersecretary for food, nutrition, and consumer services. “We thought it was a prudent time to have a scientific review of the package.” USDA seeks to provide greater encouragement and support for breastfeeding, address overweight and obesity, reinforce nutrition education messages, and provide more culturally appropriate foods for the ethnically diverse population of the more than eight million women and children who receive WIC benefits.

Nutrition advocates responded positively to the USDA initiative, which has been in the works for years. “Overall, we’re really happy about this food package,” stated Geri Henchy, director of early childhood nutrition for the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) in Washington, D.C. “We think for WIC clients, this is going to make a huge difference. We like the idea that there are choices; that clients go to the grocery store and can pick the fruits and vegetables they want,” Henchy added.

Major proposed changes include:

- providing a monthly benefit for fruits and vegetables of the client’s choosing;
- a reduction in the amount of juice for children ages one through five;
- cutting the amount of milk for children from three cups daily to two;
- permitting substitution of soy milk and tofu for dairy products; and
- adding whole grain bread to the package and allowing substitutions such as corn tortillas and brown rice.

The revisions were based upon an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report on the WIC Program issued last year. However, full implementation of the IOM recommendations would have cost an additional $1.3 billion over five years. “We are disappointed that some budget constraints USDA placed on itself means the proposal doesn’t allow the full amount of fruits and vegetables, which WIC clients need and the IOM recommended,” noted FRAC’s Henchy.

Henchy did point out that the new fruit and vegetable benefits can likely be used at farmers’ markets as well as grocery stores and should not affect the supplemental coupons that more than two million WIC participants receive annually under a separate program – the Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program or FMNP.

USDA will accept comments on the proposed food package through November 6, 2006. Comments may be submitted by mail, email, the USDA web site, or through the Federal eRulemaking Portal. New food packages could be in place as early as late 2007. “USDA is very committed to moving interim final regulations out quickly,” Henchy told Foodlinks America, “so it could be within a year from the end of the comment period.”

More detail may be found in the 73-page proposed rule published in the August 7, 2006 Federal Register at: http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/…gov/2006/pdf/06-6627.pdf.

· WIC-only stores restricted: Federal requirements for WIC vendor cost containment, effective July 1, 2006, have begun to drive so-called “WIC-only” stores out-of-business. These stores, which cater exclusively to low-income women in WIC but charge more than regular grocery stores, have been increasing program costs.

USDA issued a policy memorandum in March 2006 requiring states to “compute new maximum allowable reimbursement levels” targeting vendors that derive more than half of their annual food sales revenue from WIC vouchers, termed “above-50-percent vendors.” The policy memo followed the dismissal of a lawsuit by the National WIC Grocers Association in U.S. District Court in late December 2005 that had sought to keep such stores in the program without restrictions. The cost containment provisions would be codified under a proposed rule published in the August 1, 2006 Federal Register at: http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/…gov/2006/pdf/06-6596.pdf .

Limitations on WIC-only stores, which have operated in 21 states, may have their biggest impact in California, where more than 600 such stores redeem nearly half of all WIC vouchers. “To gain competitive advantage, most WIC-only stores offered participants incentive items such as extra juice, pots and pans, strollers, etc.,” noted the California WIC Association (CWA) in a March 2006 update. “The problem with these popular incentives and extra services is that WIC food funds were being used to pay for them …. new vendor cost containment measures are necessary to protect WIC’s fiscal integrity and allow the program to continue serving vulnerable families,” concluded CWA.

· Infant formula costs rising: Because more than half of all infant formula sold in the U.S. is purchased through the WIC Program, USDA and the states have been able to exert considerable leverage on reducing formula costs over the history of the program. Infant formula rebates in fiscal year 2004 totaled $1.6 billion, an amount that supported about 25 percent of all WIC participants.

However, rebates as a percentage of total WIC food costs have been dropping in recent years, from a high of 33.5 percent in fiscal year 2000 to 31.6 percent in fiscal year 2004. Currently, both net wholesale prices and retail markups on formula offered by the three companies in the business – Mead Johnson, Ross Laboratories, and Nestle – have increased, causing concern in the WIC community. For, as USDA notes in its August 2006 study, Recent Trends and Economic Issues in the WIC Infant Formula Rebate Program, “higher costs mean that fewer people will be served.”

To view the study, which examines infant formula rebate trends from January 1998 to January 2006, go to: http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err22/.

Food Stamp Facts

· Living within a food stamp budget I: The U.S. Department of Agriculture bases benefits in the Food Stamp Program (FSP) on the Thrifty Food Plan (TFP). According to USDA, the TFP “serves as a national standard for a nutritious diet at minimal cost … based on national average food prices.” Four broad categories of food contribute 92 percent of the TFP’s cost: 1) meats, poultry, fish, and eggs; 2) cereals and bakery goods; 3) dairy products; and 4) fruits and vegetables.

A recent study released by USDA, How Low-Income Households Allocate Their Food Budget Relative to the Cost of the Thrifty Food Plan, found that the food expenditures of low-income households – including food at home and food away from home – averaged about 125 percent of the Thrifty Food Plan budget. “They spent about the TFP amount on cereals and bakery products, 53 percent of the TFP amount for fruits and vegetables, 70 percent of the TFP amount for meat, poultry, fish, and eggs, and about 74 percent of the TFP amount for dairy products,” USDA noted. For further information, see: http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err20/err20_reportsummary.pdf.

· Living within a food stamp budget II: Trying to live on a food stamp budget is not easy, as Doron Taussig, a reporter for the Philadelphia City Paper, found out when he and his wife accepted the “Food Stamp Challenge” from a local anti-hunger group to try to live on the TFP for just five days. Figuring the maximum TFP benefit for two for the period at $46.34, Taussig drove to his local grocery store to test out his new budget, acknowledging that “many people on food stamps don’t have a car or a nearby supermarket.”

After small, unsatisfying, and repetitive meals for several days, Taussig commented that “the element of choice that makes eating a form of recreation is gone. Food is no longer fun. That pretty much sums up the experience. Living on food stamps is possible, especially if you have access to an affordable grocery store, but it’s also exceedingly unpleasant: monotonous, unhealthy, enervating, and so fragile that minor mistakes can send you reeling for days.” He noted that others he spoke to who had accepted the challenge “had a similar experience. They were able to design an affordable diet, but they were miserable on it. Many cheated and several quit.” To read Taussig’s diary of his TFP experiment, go to: http://citypaper.net/articles/2006-08-10/cb.shtml.

· Outreach grants awarded: USDA, on August 28, 2006, announced funding of just over $1 million to 15 faith and community-based organizations around the nation to implement food stamp outreach projects. Grants of $75,000 each were awarded to groups such as Catholic Charities of Wichita in Wichita, KS, the Montana Food Bank in Missoula, MT, and the New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority in Bedford, NH.

The outreach projects will use a variety of strategies to inform low-income people about the benefits of the FSP, including information dissemination, pre-screening, application assistance, community events, education programs, and train-the-trainer programs. For more information, see: http://www.fns.usda.gov/cga/PressReleases/2006/PR-0323.htm.

Cranberries Coming, but Bonus Amounts Still Lagging

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has announced that it will purchase 16.8 million pounds of cranberry products for distribution to domestic child nutrition and food assistance programs, including The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP). It is anticipated that the cranberries, in juice and sauce form, will be delivered around Thanksgiving.

Emergency food providers nationwide, however, continue to feel the pinch of reduced amounts of bonus commodities being offered by USDA. Though summer is usually an active season for bonus purchases, the Department has bought no other items recently, except some asparagus in May and a small amount of raspberries in June. USDA officials told Foodlinks America that no totals for fiscal year 2006 bonus commodities have yet been calculated, but the volume and dollar value are expected to be just a fraction of the food provided in previous years. USDA has indicated that bonus instant nonfat dry milk will be available in fiscal year 2007, but no other bonus commodities are being discussed at this time.

In another commodity-related matter, USDA has proposed rules to revise and clarify requirements for the processing of donated foods. Schools and other child nutrition programs can direct their commodities to commercial processors to have them made into end products that are suitable for use in feeding programs. For example, a processor may receive flour, tomatoes, and cheese that can be made into pizzas.

For several years, processors have been allowed to substitute commercially purchased fruits, vegetables, eggs, and chicken to make end products if USDA-donated commodities were not available or insufficient. The rules proposed in the August 24, 2006 Federal Register would also permit the substitution of commercially purchased beef and pork, as long as it is of domestic origin and of equal or better quality, and would require multi-state processors to sign national processing agreements with USDA if they plan to deliver products to more than one state.

Industry welcomed the proposed revisions. “This is the biggest change to come out of USDA since poultry substitution,” said a spokesperson for the American Commodity Distribution Association. Comments on the proposed rule, which may be viewed at: http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/…gov/2006/pdf/06-7073.pdf, are due by November 22, 2006.

Obesity Round-Up

South tips the scales of obesity rankings: The latest figures are in and nine of the ten states with the most obese populations are in the South. “The South is the ‘Biggest Belt,’” claimed the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH), a Washington, D.C. health advocacy organization, in its August 19, 2006 report, F is for Fat: How Obesity Policies are Failing in America, 2006.

Mississippi was the heaviest state, with an adult obesity rate of 29.5 percent. It was followed by Alabama, West Virginia, Louisiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, South Carolina, Indiana, and Texas. Overall, adult obesity rates increased in 31 states last year and stayed level in the others.

“The bad news is that not enough progress has been made in the past year, and America’s obesity epidemic continues to get worse,” said Jeff Levi, executive director of TFAH. “Quick fixes and limited government programs have failed to stem the tide. The ‘fad diet’ approach does not work for individuals, and it’s not going to work for our nation’s obesity crisis either. Government must step up and provide sustainable funding for sound, long-term policies that produce significant results.”

TFAH recommended a 20-step action plan to tackle the obesity problem, including fast-track research, increased access to healthier foods, improving the built environment, physical fitness curricula in schools, and employer-sponsored programs to promote health. For more details and to view the report, go to: http://healthyamericans.org/reports/obesity2006/.

Sugary drinks implicated: Soft drink consumption trends are mirrored in the increase in obesity among Americans over the past 40 years and action is needed to effect change, according to a recent literature review from researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health and published in the August 2006 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. An extra can of soda a day can result in an extra 15 pounds per year.

Soft drinks “clearly have no vitamins, no minerals, no phytochemicals, so they’re basically empty calories,” said Dr. Frank Hu, lead author of the review. “By reducing them, you are not losing anything but the calories.” Although Hu shied away from making a direct connection, other obesity experts did not. Recent beverage trends and obesity are “like documenting the force of gravity,” said Dr. David Ludwig of Children’s Hospital in Boston. “There’s an overwhelmingly strong case to be made for a causal relationship.
Find out more at: http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstract/84/2/274.

Bigger bodies, shorter lives: A study of more than 61,000 Americans between the ages of 50 and 71 has found that those who are overweight and obese in midlife have a higher risk of death. The large sample of American Association of Retired Persons (AAPR) members, found that among “healthy people who had never smoked, the risk of death was associated with both overweight and obesity among men and women.”

“In analyses of BMI [Body Mass Index] during midlife (age of 50 years) among those who had never smoked, the associations became stronger, with the risk of death increasing by 20 to 40 percent among overweight persons and by two to at least three times among obese persons.” In short, the study concluded, “Excess weight during midlife, including overweight, is associated with an increased risk of death.” Learn more at: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/355/8/763.

Community Food Projects Profile: Rebuilding a Sustainable Native Food System in the Desert

Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of articles celebrating the tenth anniversary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Community Food Projects program and featuring some of the more successful projects.

The Tohono O’odham Indian Nation in southern Arizona’s Sonoran Desert has changed markedly in the past 65 years. Gardens once dotted a landscape that is now barren. First, World War II took the men off the reservation and away from their families. Then drought devastated the area. By the mid-1990s, a full two-thirds of the reservation’s 18,000 inhabitants lived in poverty and more than 50 percent of the tribe’s adults had diabetes primarily attributable to the destruction of the traditional diet and food system.

But today, things are changing again, thanks to the efforts of Tohono O’odham Community Action (TOCA), a local non-profit organization, and the Community Food Projects (CFP) program. Small green oases of community and backyard gardens are visible in the desert. Traditional wild foods with health-giving properties, such as cholla buds and mesquite beans, may be found in stores on the Reservation. And agriculture is making a comeback, with more than 80 acres on the Reservation growing traditional crops.

TOCA first applied for CFP funding in 1997, proposing to develop a comprehensive strategy for food production, marketing and distribution, along with nutrition and cultural education activities to bolster food security in this poor Indian Nation. TOCA planned to expand community gardens, organize a desert food collection program, re-establish historic flood-based farming practices, develop markets for traditional tribal foods, and support agriculturally-related microenterprises.

In implementing a three-year, $80,000 grant award, TOCA adopted a conscious strategy of addressing the most immediate needs. First and most importantly, families and communities were provided the resources they needed to grow and collect traditional foods for their own consumption. Through this prioritization, the CFP project began to revive a way of life and a culture that had almost been lost, reflecting the Tribal Himdag or adage: “Wisdom from our past creating solutions for our future.”

The project reawakened an interest in gardening for people of all ages. During the first year, a community garden was established at the Indian Health Service hospital in Sells. With the support of the hospital staff and a hands-on education program, traditional foods believed to reduce and prevent the effects of diabetes were grown. Assistance was also provided for the creation and/or expansion of gardens at the Tohono O’odham Elderly Program, the Santa Rosa Ranch School (grades K-8), and the Tribal Head Start Program.

In years two and three, the project focused on the promotion of household gardens. TOCA provided equipment, fencing, seeds, and assistance to more than 70 households each year to grow traditional Tohono O’odham crops – squash, corn, tepary beans, and melons – to increase their self-sufficiency. Another important crop was devil’s claw, a fiber plant used in basket weaving. TOCA grew devil’s claw in a section of the community gardens to help supply the 15 members of the Tohono O’odham Basketweavers Organization (TOBO), a marketing cooperative that helped create sustainable, culturally appropriate economic development.

A number of TOCA-sponsored trips to harvest wild foods were made during all three years of the project to help residents locate sustainable sources of other traditional foods also effective in combating diabetes. Elders and youth joined together to collect saguaro fruit, acorns, cholla buds, and mesquite bean pods for household consumption. In the second and third years, a five-day bahidaj (saguaro cactus fruit) camp was held, involving up to 60 tribal members each year. One year, over 450 pounds of fruit pulp was collected and processed to make saguaro wine and revitalize the traditional rain ceremony.

A key CFP project objective, redeveloping flood-based farming practices, was tested successfully in the summer of 1999, after a community on the reservation invited TOCA to conduct a demonstration there. The area, unaffected by flood control projects, was planted in traditional crops in the ak chin, or floodplain fields method, and a Nawait I:i (rain ceremony) was held for the first time in nearly 30 years, with over 100 Tribal members participating in this historic event.

The notable success of the original CFP grant for both the Tohono O’odham people and TOCA inspired the organization to seek a second round of CFP funding, and TOCA was awarded another three-year grant in 2001 for $135,000. The second project built upon and expanded activities to create culturally appropriate, agriculturally based economic development, focusing on additional food production, processing, and distribution activities sensitive to the Tribal culture and traditions.

To meet expanded food production needs on the Reservation, TOCA purchased a tractor, trailer, and truck and planted more than 30 acres in traditional crops by the end of 2004. A water catchment system and 725-gallon water trailer helped moderate the effects of the ongoing drought and permitted some irrigation.

TOCA’s success in agricultural production prompted the Tribal Farming Authority to lease 17 acres of irrigated cropland to the organization in 2003. Then, in 2004, the Authority offered TOCA a no-cost five-year lease on a 1,100 acre property that it controlled, known as Papago Farms. By the summer of 2006, TOCA reported that it is now growing crops on more than 80 acres, maintaining a 78-acre commercial operation at Papago Farms along with the four-acre traditional ak-chin farm.

Wild food collection and distribution also increased significantly under the second grant. Gathering of cholla buds, saguaro cactus fruit, and mesquite pods by both volunteers and small entrepreneurs allowed the grantee to purchase and market these healthy wild food items in every retail outlet on the Reservation (one supermarket and six small groceries), as well as to gourmet markets off the Reservation. In addition, a Native Food Festival attended by over 350 producers has attracted an estimated 5,000 visitors a year.

The importance of these efforts to the Tohono O’odham Tribe was described succinctly by CFP project director Tristan Reader: “Virtually all elements of traditional culture – ceremonies, stories, songs, language – are directly rooted in the system of food production. O’odham culture is truly agri/culture. Some people say, ‘Isn’t this just nostalgic?’ But it’s literally a matter of physical and cultural survival.”

Small Bites

The way we live I: (from U.S. Census Bureau statistics on single-family homes in 2005)

Big houses: The average size house is 2,434 square feet.

At big prices: The average home price is $297,000.

Protected from the elements: 34 percent have vinyl siding.

With access to the outdoors in front: 53 percent have a porch.

And back: 46 percent have a patio.

And above: 27 percent have a deck.

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