| An article in this morning's Baltimore Sun touches on the troubles faced by a project of Johns Hopkins University to get better food into urban corner stores, which in too many inner-city neighborhoods are the only places available for residents of these areas to purchase food.
Corporate supermarkets have long ago abandoned poor people in these neighborhoods, fleeing to the outer areas of cities and into well-off suburbs. And unfortunately, the 'food' available in the remaining establishments are mostly limited to potato chips, soda, highly processed microwavable convenience 'foods', and of course loosey cigarettes and malt liquor. As if the social and economic environments in these neighborhoods of Newark, East Orange, Camden, Detroit, Cleveland, St. Louis, Baltimore, etc... weren't bad enough, residents also have to deal with toxic food environments that make it near impossible for them and their children to eat healthy. More than a few groups are currently working towards solutions to this problem from many angles, and projects like the Healthy Corner Stores Network are a great place to at least start to greatly improve upon what already exists in these neighborhoods, before much better permanent solutions can be found and implemented. |
A few quotes and notes from and on the Baltimore Sun article also linked to above -
A Johns Hopkins University project to get better food into the stores - and, ultimately, improve the health of urban residents - is expanding this fall from 17 stores to 35, scattered across the city. Store owners who agree to stock the healthful foods receive promotional materials, shelf labels and posters. Hopkins researchers offer samples to customers and do cooking demonstrations to introduce new foods. They sometimes provide stores with bananas and whole wheat bread on a trial basis.
I love the bolded part there - excellent idea. That's what many quality farmers markets already do, although obviously most low-income inner-city residents lacking transportation and working 2 jobs to support themselves and their families aren't going to be able to make it to these places often, if at all. Love that they're bringing it right into under-served communities, instead...
But the healthful foods don't always sell.
"I'm not a big fan of whole-wheat bread. I like white bread," said Nytearia Bradshaw, 16, who was standing outside the New Sandtown Market on North Calhoun Street after buying white bread, potato chips and soda for the children she was baby-sitting. "We teenagers, we live it up. We like to eat junk food."
Hmmm. What to do about that? The aforementioned 'promotional materials and posters' sound like a good place to at least start - but I wish I could see what they look like, and maybe be able to judge their potential effectiveness. I've searched around, but can't find anything on them...
Long way to go to change attitudes there. There's the effects of advertising aimed at children right there, in all its 'glory'. It's pretty hard to deny that this is a direct result of the fact that television advertising directed at children from preschool age plants the idea in their impressionable minds that it's "cool" to eat Big Macs and drink Coke, and everybody who's anybody would never think of eating anything else. Cartoon characters selling breakfast cereals and 'fruit' snacks that are just one or two minor ingredients shy of being simply pure sugar, and etc...
We can make fruits, vegetables and whole grains available, but how do we make them 'cool'? I have an idea or three, but they'd be considered 'mean-spirited'. I'd like to just simply show them the effects of a lifetime of eating absolute crap. Why don't we associate the end stage of diet-related diseases permanently with Golden Arches and Pepsi logos, in the most graphic and dramatic ways possible? There's an idea for a public school health class curriculum. I remember they used something along those lines when I was in high school, as part of an anti-drunk driving campaign. If it's good enough to scare the crap out of kids on that issue...
But I guess the drunk driving lobby has nothing on the HFCS and fast 'food' lobbies...
Franco found that in 21 stores - all in black neighborhoods - the food is kept behind bulletproof glass and sold through a revolving window, making it impossible for customers to assess the quality of the food or read nutrition labels.
Wow, I never even saw that living in Newark. I do remember that from a few gas station c-stores, though...but the only thing available in those places was pretty much candy and bags of chips (and of course, cigarettes...). I wonder if those are the types of places the author is describing here? If that's the case, though...I'd suggest that it doesn't matter one whit whether or not you can 'assess the quality of the food or read nutrition labels'. All of that 'food' is crap, period. Please, let's not distract ourselves from the real issues here by considering whether one Frito Lay's product is slightly 'healthier' than another. 'Baked' empty calories are still empty calories...
One more thing to consider from the article, and it's a good one -
There are about 800 corner stores in Baltimore. Many lack any kind of refrigeration, except for cases to cool bottles of soda, so selling produce is almost impossible. Instead, the stores offer racks of processed food, heavily marketed by the manufacturers and sold cheaply to a captive audience.
But now I'm thinking, can't those refrigerators refrigerate anything? Rip out the damned bottle-holder shelves, and put in normal flat ones. That'd solve that pretty quick, no? |
