First Lady Michelle Obama’s ” Let’s Move”

First lady Michelle Obama today is announcing a national campaign to combat the epidemic of childhood obesity through what her office calls “a comprehensive approach that builds on effective strategies, engages families and communities, and mobilizes both public and private sector resources.”

“The ‘Let’s Move’ campaign will focus on reaching a national goal of solving the childhood obesity challenge within a generation so that children born today will reach adulthood at a healthy weight,” the first lady’s office said.

Answering First Lady Michelle Obama’s call for innovative industry
initiatives that contribute to her healthy families program, America’s non-alcoholic beverage
companies are coming together to make the calories in their products even more clear and
consumer-friendly by putting the information on the front of all their packages, vending
machines and fountain machines.

The voluntary commitment contributes to Mrs. Obama’s efforts to help families make informed
choices as part of a balanced lifestyle. The companies will coordinate with the Food and Drug
Administration to implement the calorie initiative, which will go above and beyond what is
required by the federal agency’s food labeling regulations. The industry will start implementing
the initiative across the country this year with completion in 2012.  For more information on this program- Clear on Calories- on the Clear on Calories page.

The Alliance for a Healthier Generation, a joint initiative of the American Heart Association and the William J. Clinton Foundation, is committed to fighting childhood obesity by facilitating change in the environments that contribute to the quality of nutrition and access to physical activity for our nation’s youth.

In conjunction with its Healthy Schools Program, the Alliance in 2006 met with representatives from beverage companies PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, and Cadbury Schweppes as well as representatives from the American Beverage Association to develop a set of voluntary guidelines related to the sale of beverages in our nation’s schools. The guidelines will also serve as the beverage standard for the Healthy Schools Program recognition criteria. The standards encourage the availability of nutritious and lower calorie beverages and will both reduce the calories and limit portion sizes for caloric drinks available to students in schools.

Click on Model School Guidelines page to the right for complete guidelines.

There is no one solution to solve the issue of childhood obesity, but the core of the problem lies with the fact that young people consume more calories than they burn. These guidelines are just one part of an overall strategy to decrease calories consumed while increasing calories burned. Along with the Alliance’s other strategies – improving snack foods and meals available to students and increasing physical activity and physical education – these guidelines could make a significant contribution to reducing childhood obesity.