A Comprehensive Food Strategy
Our children are fatter and sicker than previous generations. What can we do to ensure every Canadian has access to healthy food?
Olivia and the New Democrats have ideas for a comprehensive food strategy:
• Enact legislation that will require that food be properly labelled with information on its origin, its nutritional value and whether it is genetically modified or not.
• Establish a national children’s nutritious food program to make healthy lunches and snacks available in schools, community and child care centres.
• Ban junk food ads till after 9 pm so children won’t be bombarded with unhealthy food choices. If cigarettes companies can’t advertise to children, the same logic should apply to food that makes our kids sick.
• Offer incentives and design tax policies to promote local food production, such as farmers’ markets and agriculture co-operatives.
• Require that imported foods meet the same environmental and health standards that apply to food produced in Canada.
