Noem: obesity okay because local control means donor cash

South Dakota's kids are fatter than ever.

In the farm-to-fork-crazed city of Portland, Oregon, campus gardens supply public school cafeterias and food service workers seek out chicken free of antibiotics. “We should not have what is served for lunch at schools decided by bureaucrats in Washington,” said Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., who wrote one of multiple bills that would ease the rules. “This has become a burden.” A letter from 19 past presidents of the School Nutrition Association urged the administration not to bend to the demands of their own group. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association and the American Heart Association have joined the USDA in campaigning against any weakening of the rules.

Read it here.

Schwan's Food Service manufactures subsidized products from commodities then markets them to distributors like Reinhart and Sysco who sell them to school lunch programs.

Marshall, Minnesota-based pizza peddler Schwan's gives Republicans including South Dakota's At-large Representative Kristi Noem campaign cash. So do other industrial ag companies like Crystal Sugar selling salted fat to schools. Now she is paying them back.

Rep. Kristi Noem on Tuesday announced plans for legislation that reduces federal mandates on school meal standards, including the more stringent whole grain requirements that went into effect in July 2014 and the Target 2 sodium requirements set to be implemented in the coming years. [Mitchell Daily Republic]

Mother Jones tells readers why:

But opponents of the act argue that the requirements leave students with unappetizing choices that result in tons of waste. This notion was supported in a spring 2014 report from the Harvard School of Public Health, which found that nearly 75 percent of vegetables and 40 percent of fruit being served in school cafeterias were ending up in trash cans. But critics have pointed out that helping "struggling schools" is not the sole agenda of the SNA—its sponsors include Domino's Pizza, General Mills Foodservice, PepsiCo Foodservice, and Tyson Foods, Inc.—all of whom contract with school cafeterias and would benefit from less stringent nutritional regulations. [Allie Gross]

Progress has been made under current school lunch rules but as industrial agriculture lines Republican pockets South Dakota's children will again suffer from elevated risks to obesity.

Most South Dakota schools could be feeding food waste to chickens and hogs maybe composting for community gardens. Hot Springs, Philip and Midland enjoy geothermic water to heat greenhouses.