Minneapolis FSD: Fresh produce should be mandatory

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As one of three school district nutrition leaders set to speak at the United Fresh Washington Conference in late September, Bertrand Weber knows that fresh fruits and vegetables will be a central topic of discussion. He is prepared.

Weber, who since 2012 has been director of the Minneapolis Public School Culinary and Nutrition Services, said he believes fresh produce should be a required component in school meals.

Weber and other members of the nutrition panel — Donna Martin, director of the School Nutrition Program, Burke County Board of Education, Waynesboro, Ga., and Eric Goldstein, CEO, New York City Department of Education, School Food, New York, N.Y. — are scheduled to appear together on a panel Sept. 29 at noon in Washington, D.C.

“No matter what the push back might be, that one component is one that kids must have in their diet,” Weber said.

School meals can’t continue to be geared toward processed and fast foods, he said.

“We have the tightest school regulations in the world, but we sill have the absolute worst diet in the world,” he said.

Fresh fruits and vegetables, done right, are a crucial part of a child’s diet, Weber said.

“If a child doesn’t want to take a math class, we don’t give him an option to opt out,” he said. “We mandate certain curriculum, but yet we give a 6 year old the option to make his own choice on food choices? It doesn’t make sense.”

Teaching and modeling eating behavior is a moral obligation, and Weber said the idea that kids only like “kid food” was created by adults, not by kids.

Weber was born in Switzerland and has worked for 35 years in the hospitality industry and foodservice industry, including top hotels and resorts on the East Coast.

He came to the Hopkins School District in Minnesota in 2003, and in 2004 he initiated one of Minnesota’s first farm to school program.

Under his watch, Minneapolis schools are on the leading edge of the farm to school movement and they giving students a new way to think about school meals.

When Weber arrived in 2012, he said the Minneapolis schools were on a “pre-plated” and packaged model. At that time, meals were sent to schools in little pre-packs, with fruits and vegetables offered in individually wrapped baggies.

“Not a whole lot of emphasis was done on the promotion of fresh fruits and vegetables,” he said.