Eat your veggies, province tells children
KAREN HOWLETT
TORONTO -- The Ontario government is ramping up its war on obesity by trying to get children in northern communities to eat their veggies.
Health Promotion Minister Jim Watson said yesterday the government would launch a pilot project this fall that would offer apples, carrot sticks and other fresh fruit and vegetables to children in elementary schools in Northern Ontario.
"My ultimate goal is, if successful, I'd like to see it stretched throughout the province of Ontario," Mr. Watson said.
His ministry will spend about $450,000 on the project in elementary schools north of Parry Sound, which is 230 kilometres north of Toronto. The list of schools will be released next month.
The project is similar to initiatives in other jurisdictions, including British Columbia, which set up a pilot program in 10 elementary schools last year, and England, which rolled out a program to students in more than 500 schools in 2000.
Mr. Watson said childhood obesity rates have tripled in 15 years. A Statistics Canada report said last week that one in every six adults in the country is obese.
The project is the government's response to a November, 2004 report by Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health Sheela Basrur, which sounded the alarm about an "obesity epidemic" that is threatening the health of Ontarians by contributing to a dramatic increase in heart disease, stroke and hypertension.
"I am very heartened by the government's response to my report," Dr. Basrur said in an interview. "This is a very promising start towards a strategy that ultimately will need to extend more broadly."
Dr. Basrur said the north is the right place to begin the pilot project because fresh fruit and vegetables are both scarce and expensive, especially in remote communities.
But New Democrat MPP Shelley Martel criticized Premier Dalton McGuinty's government for taking so long to respond to Dr. Basrur's report.
"I have to say that the McGuinty government did not put much of a priority on her report or on her ability if it took them 19 long months to actually respond to what she had to say," Ms. Martel said.
Many communities have started their own movements to encourage children to eat more fruits and vegetables. In Windsor, JumpStart Community Nutrition provides fresh vegetables four days a week to 280 students under a 12-week pilot project.
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