[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 39 (Thursday, April 11, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H1271]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            CHILD NUTRITION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HINOJOSA. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to speak about a serious 
problem that is affecting the health of our children. I am talking 
about childhood obesity.
  In his recent ``Call to action to prevent and decrease overweight and 
obesity,'' the surgeon general found that in 1999, over 13 percent of 
children ages 6 to 11 and 14 percent of adolescents ages 12 to 19 years 
are overweight. Nationwide, the number of overweight children has 
tripled over the last two decades.
  This has led to a staggering increase in children with Type 2 
diabetes, a disease that normally affects senior adults. Sixty percent 
of obese children ages 5 to 10 have at least one risk factor for heart 
disease, and 25 percent have two or more factors.
  As obese children grow up, they are likely to remain obese as adults, 
and continue to be at risk for a variety of health problems. If we are 
to reverse this trend, parents, schools, and the government must work 
harder to address this problem early, before our children's health is 
affected.
  I want to commend two organizations in my congressional district that 
are doing just that. The Region One Education Service Center in 
Edinburg, Texas, and the Texas School Food Service Association have 
taken the lead in working with our schools to improve nutrition and 
encourage physical activity to reduce childhood obesity.
  Our schools are working hard to reverse this trend toward obesity. 
Many schools that eliminated physical education programs are 
reinstating them.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to show that there is a great need for 
improvement in school meals, with this poster. Our schools are working 
hard to reverse the trend, as I said earlier. Thanks to the work of the 
Texas Food Service Association and the National Food Service 
Association, between 1991 and 1998, there has been a significant trend 
toward lower levels of fat and saturated fat in school meals. More 
schools serve low-fat milk and provide healthful food choices in the 
school cafeterias.
  Despite these successes, there still is work to be done. While school 
breakfasts are close to meeting all Federal nutrition standards, many 
of the school lunch programs still do not meet Federal nutrition 
guidelines.
  The school meal programs also face competition from vending machines 
and fundraising food sales at schools that encourage children to skip 
the more nutritious school meal and eat snacks and sodas that are full 
of fat, salt, and sugar. Despite their good efforts, our schools cannot 
do it all. Parents need to take responsibility, and the Federal 
Government has to do its part.
  I urge my colleagues here in Congress to join me in cosponsoring H.R. 
2129, the Better Nutrition for Schoolchildren Act of 2001. This bill 
will give the U.S. Department of Agriculture the authority to extend 
nutrition guidelines to every food product in our schools, including 
those outside of the cafeteria.
  As we look towards next year's reauthorization of the Child Nutrition 
Act, I hope that we in Congress will be a partner, not a hindrance, in 
improving the health and nutrition of our schoolchildren. Our children 
deserve no less.
  Again, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in 
cosponsoring H.R. 2129, and let us pass this legislation.

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