Members in the News: Smith, Weinberg, Featherstone, and Stefanou et. al

Travis Smith, University of Georgia Do school food programs improve child dietary quality? By OUPBlog: AJAE - January 30, 2017 Written by: Travis Smith Each school day, more than 30 million children in the United States receive a meal through the National School Lunch Program (NSLP); many of those students also rely on the School Breakfast Program (SBP) for their morning-time meal. These two long-standing federally subsidized meal programs were enacted on the premise of providing school children with “adequate nutrition” and “an adequate supply of food.” As the second largest food assistance program in the US, cash payments to participating schools were over $16 billion in 2014, or about 10% of the US Department of Agriculture’s total spending. But, as the adage goes, “There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch”–participating schools must meet minimal nutritional standards in order to receive federal cash assistance. Over the past 70 years, school meal standards have become increasingly focused on raising the quality of school food rather than simply supplying food. But exactly how does the quality of a school meal compare to a brown-bag meal from home? Turns out, the answer isn’t as simple as comparing the average school lunch to the average sack lunch; we must dig deeper, far below and above the average child, where very-low and very-high quality diets exist. (Continued...) Read the entire article on OUPBlog: AJAE Marca Weinberg, USDA Economic Research Service Get To Know 25 Women Leading Data And Analytics In The U.S. Government By Forbes - January 27, 2017 Marca Weinberg Manage research that provides information and analysis on farming and other rural industry. Has investigated issues such as water quality-quantity tradeoffs, Federal water policy reform, and the economic implications of the Federal Endangered Species Act. Director, Resource and Rural Economics Division, Economic Research Service, US Department of Agriculture. (Continued...) Read the entire article on the Forbes website Allen Featherstone, Kansas State University Navigating a Struggling Farm Economy By Pork Network - January 26, 2017 “Farm costs are 90 percent of revenue. Can we cut them to 80 percent?” Featherstone asked participants at a recent conference, “Top 10 Considerations to Navigate a Struggling Farm Economy.” K-State is hosting several of the programs in locations across the state to help farmers think critically about how their farms might withstand the tough times. (Continued...) Read the entire article on the Pork Network website Spiro Stefanou, University of Florida (et. al) Florida Agricultural Policy Outlook Conference is Next Week By Southeast AgNet- January 30, 2017 “Agriculture is a vital industry for Florida with interesting opportunities and compelling challenges as we move into the future,” said Spiro Stefanou, chair of the UF/IFAS food and resource economics department. “Our goal is to bring industry experts, researchers, policy and business leaders together to discuss the current and emerging challenges related to Florida as an engine of innovation, policy related to food, nutrition and consumer decision making, water quality and management, agricultural labor and the prospects for our fruit and vegetable industry.” Speakers Zhengfei Guan, UF/IFAS assistant professor of food and resource economics, speaking about the fruit and vegetable industry – threats, challenges and opportunities. Guan will cover challenges in production, trade and competition, and the impacts of the Food Safety Modernization Act, the North American Free Trade Agreement and the tomato suspension agreement. Jaclyn Kropp, UF/IFAS assistant professor of food and resource economics, speaking on food, nutrition and health. Kropp will focus on the National School Lunch Program and initiatives to get children to make healthier food choices. Gulcan Onel, UF/IFAS assistant professor of food and resource economics, speaking on agricultural labor and immigration. Onel will talk about the extent to which immigrant farmworkers affect the economic opportunities of native farm workers. She’ll also talk about findings from the Florida citrus workers survey conducted during the last harvest year. Brandon McFadden, UF/IFAS assistant professor of food and resource economics, speaking on economic issues for genetically modified organisms. The topic for McFadden’s talk stems from the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard (NBFDS), signed into law on July 29, 2016. McFadden will discuss the implications of the standard for agricultural and food industries. (Conintued...) Read the entire article on Southeast AgNet

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