In an undergraduate classroom at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill in 2017, a group of students sat in front of a plate of sushi from a local restaurant. But it wasn’t lunchtime — the students were attempting to quantify how common the mislabeling of red snapper was across North Carolina. 

By analyzing the DNA from 43 fish samples they’d collected from seafood markets, grocery stores and restaurants across 10 counties, they found that a whopping 90.7% were mislabeled as red snapper. Most often, the substitutions were tilapia or vermillion snapper. 

“It’s really hard to know where the mislabeling is happening, obviously, because a lot of seafood goes through a number of steps; it changes hands like five to seven times,” said Dr. John Bruno, instructor and creator of the class. “So it’s hard to know who’s doing it.”

Bruno was asked by the university to create an undergraduate course that gave first-year students real research experience. The idea was to engage students in science early on, and increase retention and diversity in STEM, or science, technology, engineering and math.

“They’re students that have never held a pipette. They’ve never asked a question, never developed a hypothesis,” Bruno said. “The idea was to develop a question that’s applied, that’s meaningful to them, that they can grasp, and then use that question to teach the basic research techniques.”

According to Bruno, mislabeling — essentially committing fraud — is rampant in the food industry. So diving into the mislabeling of local seafood was something Bruno felt the students could investigate.

Why is mislabeling so widespread? “I think there’s clearly a lack of enforcement and a lack of testing,” Bruno said.

Mislabeling rampant

Based on customer demand, certain fish can be sold for more than others. And this may tempt producers into mislabeling their fish when the desired product is out of season or low in availability.

“There’s obviously a big economic incentive to mislabel,” Bruno said.

Red snapper is a great example. It’s been overfished in the Gulf of Mexico and the southeastern Atlantic. 

“So there’s very little of it available … yet the public demands it year round just because it’s something we’re familiar with,” Bruno said. “It’s not necessarily spectacularly better than other fish. It’s just culturally in demand.”

There are some fishing operations that allow you to buy seafood straight from the fishers who caught it. But often, seafood found in restaurants and grocery stores has a much longer chain of production. It’s easy for information to get changed along the way, but harder to pin down exactly where the deception is occurring.

In Bruno’s course, students went out to restaurants and grocery stores and collected samples of seafood. The students then extracted the DNA and amplified it using PCR, or polymerase chain reaction, a testing method also used for COVID-19. A commercial lab then did the sequencing. Once the students had the genetic code back from the lab, they used online tools to determine what they were looking at.

This isn’t the only evidence of the mislabeling trend. Two other in-state examples include shrimp sold in North Carolina that were mislabeled as “local” when they weren’t, and a corporate officer with a Pamlico County-based company that sold crab meat marked as a “Product of USA” when it was, in fact, imported, who was convicted two years ago. 

In one of the published papers based on work in Bruno’s classes, the students found that in talking to people, many were not aware of the issue, but once it was brought to their attention, it concerned them.

“Once people realize that this mislabeling is there, I think they can pretty quickly get the sense for the impacts it might have on their health and their pocketbook, but also on the environment,” Bruno said. 

People trying to make informed decisions about what they’re eating, both for their health and the environment, may be getting foiled by the issue of mislabeling. Though sometimes, said Bruno, a more sustainable species is being substituted for an unsustainable one. An example is again red snapper. Sometimes fish marketed as red snapper in grocery stores is actually tilapia, which is lower in the food web and therefore has less of an impact on the environment when it is farmed. 

“I’d rather train people to just buy tilapia and be aware of what it is rather than paying red snapper prices for it,” Bruno said.

Choice experiment

By extension, creating more consumer demand for fish species that can be sustainably farmed or harvested has the power to direct the industry, and decrease the motivation for mislabeling.

Jane Harrison, coastal economics specialist for North Carolina Sea Grant, was one of the authors of a report detailing trends in consumer demand for North Carolina seafood.

The authors sought to find out how often respondents ate seafood at home and at restaurants, where they got it from, how interested consumers are in knowing where their seafood comes from, and how their perception of that seafood changes based on certain attributes such as product safety and environmental concerns.

Across 1,400 respondents, Harrison and her team conducted a “choice experiment,” wherein people are given several options for seafood from different countries and asked to make decisions.

The results indicated that North Carolina residents would prefer to buy state-sourced seafood over options from foreign countries and even over other states on the East Coast. 

“Most of the time, people aren’t thinking about just one thing when they’re in the grocery store (or) in the restaurant,” said Harrison. “But certainly that local sourcing does have a significant impact on willingness to pay.”

North Carolinians want the money they spend on seafood to support the livelihoods of local commercial fishermen. The respondents valued the flavorful, healthy options from the local market, the local variety and safe handling practices.

“You think about any product, there’s really a series of attributes that are going to affect the price and people’s willingness to pay,” Harrison said. Adding, look at a car, for example. People will pay based on the gas mileage, the color, the make and model. “There’s a variety of attributes that affect your choice, just like seafood.”

That said, the most common factor that would sway respondents from buying local seafood was cost. State-sourced seafood tends to cost more, and that’s a deciding factor for many people.

This makes sense, but starts to fall apart if the fish you are buying is inappropriately labeled from the start. Even if all labels were accurate, there is no one labeling certification that addresses all aspects of environmental sustainability and social responsibility. That’s why some organizations advocate buyers move away from a labels-based approach toward a values-based approach. There are resources online for helping people bypass mislabeling issues and buy direct from fishermen, such as the Local Catch Seafood Finder and Carteret Catch.

The future of food

In a future where the seafood industry is socially sustainable, more direct communication and exchange between consumers and fishermen would likely help a lot. But the industry also has to be viable for those doing the fishing or cultivation.

North Carolina has long been a hot spot for oysters, and various government actions and research have supported this industry. The state joined the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Shellfish Initiative in 2018 with several goals, one being to create stable jobs. Scientists at all the major universities in the state contribute to research helping farmers grow oysters successfully. But making oyster cultivation an economically viable job is still a work in progress. This summer, changes made to the state’s Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program, or NAP, can help oyster farmers in case of emergency. 

The changes increase the payout per oyster in the event of a crisis like a mass mortality or a hurricane to more accurately reflect market value of the oyster, and the size that is in demand. 

“It’s a step in the right direction,” said Chris Matteo, acting president of the North Carolina Shellfish Growers Association and owner of Chadwick Creek Oysters. “It underpins the industry more effectively.”

Matteo says that going forward, he’s hopeful that NAP payouts will more accurately reflect the market value, and could even be adjusted year to year. This would make the oyster cultivation industry more economically secure for farmers in the state.

The goal of USDA programs like NAP, and of these changes, said Matteo, is to make sure growers stay in business.

All of these things will be essential to creating a socially sustainable seafood industry for the future.

This semester, UNC’s John Bruno is co-teaching a new course entitled The Future of Food. There’s a lot, he said, that he wants to cover. No one is unaffected by food.

“It’s the basis of our family lives,” Bruno said. “It’s so important in our cultures, it defines so many cultures and religious practices, and our relationship with nature now is so much just defined by food.”

This is last in a series examining the role and sustainability of seafood in a healthy diet and is published in collaboration with North Carolina Health News.

A little past 7 p.m. on a mid-September evening in Beaufort, North Carolina, pink clouds stretch across the sky and reflect in the water, surrounding the Newport River Pier as the sun fades. Scattered along the pier in clusters, are nine people who intermittently cast baited fishing hooks into the water. 

It’s a beautiful night for fishing.

When asked why they fish, many people will say that fishing is a relaxing pastime and that they often throw back what they catch. 

Aside from those who engage in recreational, commercial and sport fishing, there is a, seemingly, more elusive type of fisher — one who engages in subsistence fishing, also known as fishing for food.  

In an effort to learn more about these subsistence fishers, a group of Duke University researchers developed a research study that examines subsistence fishing. The study defines people who engage in subsistence fishing as having the following characteristics: they rely on fish to survive, have limited income, live close to the source, use basic gear to fish, and eat or sell fish to meet their needs.

In 2020, there were more than 20,000 — the number includes inland and coastal waivers — North Carolinians who received a subsistence fishing waiver, which allowed them to fish for free in North Carolina waterways, according data supplied by the Department of Environmental Quality.

An annual coastal fishing license for an adult resident is $16, and a joint inland/coastal  fishing license is $41, according to data supplied by DEQ.

Fishing waivers can be an important resource for individuals who rely on fishing to put food on the table for their household, extended family or community members. This is also important because the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025, encourages people to consume fish regularly because it provides omega-3 fatty acids, which are an essential part of a healthy diet.

Currently, in North Carolina, and across the country, there is a push to highlight the links between food, nutrition and health. Given that fish is high in omega-3s, for instance, makes it an ideal food to promote in this way.

A two-rod setup

Roy and Benny, stationed near the end of the pier, are friends who fish together regularly. They work for the same company that makes doors for walk-in coolers, they said. Benny appears subdued, content with letting Roy answer the questions about fishing.

Panning the scene on the bridge, one thing immediately stands out: most people are fishing with two rods. 

One rod is for catching any number of fish that might be biting, such as red drum, croaker, puffer fish, or mackerel, to name a few, the men explain. The second rod, in most cases, is used to catch “cut bait,” such as lizard fish, Roy said.

When he’s not casting his rod from a pier, Roy said he and his wife like to get out on the water.

“(My wife and I) fish in our kayaks three times a week, and I usually fish with (Benny) on Fridays,” said Roy. He lives on the other side of the Newport River and fishes behind his house about two times a week. 

Roy started fishing when he was around 5 years old, and said that his family once “owned the only tackle shop in town.”

While Roy did not say that he and his family depend on what they catch to feed themselves, he did say that his weekly fishing allows him to stock the freezer, which provides the family with a constant source of fish throughout the winter.

“I’ll keep them if they’re worth keeping, but I’m not one of those ones who is actively looking to keep fish,” he said. “I can go catch all the fish I want, so for me, I want something that is worth catching … It gives you an adrenaline rush more than anything.”

Minimizing cost

Nine o’clock rolls around and there are three guys bank fishing along the river, a few miles from the pier. One of them, James, is perched on a 5-gallon bucket, patiently waiting for a tug on his line. He is hoping artificial bait will entice Spanish mackerel to bite.

The area where James and two other men are fishing is dimly lit by light coming from a bridge located a few hundred yards away.

He says that Spanish mackerel will hang around as long as the water temperature is somewhere between 75 and 80 degrees. But once the temperature drops below that sweet spot, they’ll be gone for the season. 

“If I can catch 15 Spanish (mackerel) that are over 12 inches, that’s an awesome day,” James said.

James travels regularly from his home in Guilford County to the Beaufort/Morehead City area to fish. During the coronavirus pandemic, he said he left his delivery job because someone threatened him with a gun. Now, he’s trying to earn a living selling the saltwater fish he catches to customers back home. While James fishes to earn a living, he can’t afford a commercial fishing license, a large boat and all the gear that comes with the job. 

He says that for a beginning fisher or someone with limited means, purchasing the essential gear to get started does not have to be expensive.

“You can take a $10 rod and come out here and catch more fish than anybody,” he said. “I got a 3-foot rod in the back of my truck, and that rod has almost caught as many fish as any rod that I have … I bought that rod from Walmart for about $15 or $16.”

One aspect of fishing that can be expensive is buying bait. For that reason, James often uses artificial bait that he said can prove to be less expensive in the long run. However, he said that you don’t need to buy bait of any kind to be successful.

“All you need to fish is to catch one fish and you cut it up and throw it back out there (as bait) and you’ll get another one.”

Healthy diet, cause for concern

Fish has long been considered an important part of a healthy diet, but seafood consumption only received the nod from the experts recently in the federal Dietary Guidelines for Americans. In 2005, the guidelines, produced every few years by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, recommended for the first time that people should eat 8 ounces of seafood per week, according to Jessica Soldavini, a UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health professor. 

Yet, there are warnings that come with fish consumption.  Mercury and other contaminants can be passed from fish to humans. The Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, has a resource guide titled “Advice About Eating Fish” that offers suggestions for how much and what type of fish pregnant women and children should consume.

Additionally, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services includes fish consumption advisories for North Carolina on their website.

“Individuals are encouraged to check this database to see if they should limit or avoid consuming fish caught in certain bodies of water,” Soldavini said.

Some fish that are considered safe to consume for pregnant women and children are Atlantic mackerel, tilapia, catfish and whiting, for instance.

Soldavini also said that there are other affordable proteins to consider such as beans, lentils and eggs.

“Individuals may choose not to consume fish for a variety of reasons,” she said. “Other sources of omega-3 fatty acids include plant oils such as canola, flaxseed, and soybean oil and nuts and seeds like walnuts, flaxseed, and chia seeds.”

It’s a spectrum

Around 8:30 a.m. after meeting Roy, Benny and James, Daryl Mouring is the only one fishing on the pier. Mouring lives in Raleigh where he says he fishes everyday in one of the area’s freshwater sources. But once a year for the past 30 years, Mouring has made the trip from Raleigh down to Beaufort to spend time throwing his hook into the salt water.

He said he’s accustomed to catching a variety of fish during his trips to Beaufort, such as “sheepshead, black drum, croakers and puffer fish.”

But in recent years, he says, he’s noticed a change when he travels down from Raleigh to fish on the pier. 

“Ten years ago you could fill your cooler in about an hour.” This is no longer the case, he said, and he blames the change on overfishing.

That doesn’t seem to be a problem for Mouring today. This morning he’s been on the pier for about an hour and has already caught a few. Another tug on his line reveals a puffer fish, which offers little resistance as Mouring reels it in. 

As a child growing up in Washington, D.C., Mouring was taught to fish by his father –and the only fish he eats is what he catches.

“If you’re on a limited income you can’t pay (the high) price for a piece of fish,” he said. “It ain’t in your budget, it’s not worth it. I’ll look at the fish (in the store) and wish I was down here catching them.”

Aside from providing an affordable source of food, Mourning said he enjoys fishing because he likes spending time in nature and, occasionally, spending time chatting with fellow fishers.

Grant Murray is an associate professor of marine policy at Duke University and was an advisor for the “Fishing for Food” research program. When discussing the research the team did for the project, he agreed that the fishers they interviewed in the Beaufort area didn’t necessarily fit the narrow definition of a subsistence fisher, but represented a range.

“There were a few who were eating all the fish that they caught (and) depending on it daily, either for food or for income,” he said, “all the way down to people who were much more occasional in their fishing, but would give fish to family members, friends or relatives. That was a common story.”

He said he expected to hear more about subsistence fishing, but Murray said he was  surprised by some of the reasons given by people who participated in the study for why they fished that extended beyond filling the need for an affordable protein source.

“A lot of other things people talked about as benefits were camaraderie, the mental health, the social activity, the being outside, the exercise, the sense of giving to others when they’re able to share fish,” he said. “There are people out there that are out there for different reasons, different mixes of reason and (varying) dependencies on the protein.”

This is fourth in a series examining the role and sustainability of seafood in a healthy diet and is published in collaboration with North Carolina Health News.

For Debbie Callaway, life is inextricable from the seafood industry. Her grandfather was a clammer on the North River and a cook for a menhaden operation. But throughout her life, she’s watched the environment and landscape be altered by forces such as population changes, development and pollution. It feels as though access to fishable waters has become increasingly encroached upon.

“I’ve lived here in Beaufort my whole life,” Callaway said. “And the changes are just unbelievable.” 

Callaway is on the board of directors for Walking Fish, a wild-caught, community-supported fishery that distributes in Raleigh and Durham. This cooperative model is based on a common concept from land-based farming called “community supported agriculture.” The idea is that consumers buy shares of a seasonal harvest, which they pick up weekly or biweekly from a designated location. 

People who sign up get whatever is seasonally available that the fishermen catch that week — clams, oysters, flounder, shrimp, monkfish and more.

“We’re increasing the availability of seafood to people living in the Triangle, who have limited access to fresh, local seafood — delivering the seafood directly from the fishermen to the consumer,” Callaway said.

The idea behind Walking Fish is the “triple-bottom line” — that in order for something to be sustainable, it must recognize the interconnected nature of sociocultural, economic and ecological systems. The goal is to harvest only what is available seasonally, to protect the environment and use an economic model that makes the business viable for the fishermen and worthwhile for the consumer.

The environmental impact of the seafood industry is a complex issue. Overfishing has been recognized as a problem associated with large-scale commercial fishing. National Geographic reports that it emerged as an issue for the first time in the late 1800s, and through the mid-1900s affected regional fisheries poignantly. But by the end of the 20th century it was clear that the ocean, not the unlimited food resource some had thought, was approaching its breaking point. Many species, such as Atlantic cod and herring had been pushed to the edge of extinction. The pressure on biodiversity and ecosystem function grew and kept growing. 

Aquaculture — the practice of farming seafood in the ocean as an alternative to fishing — has been offered up as a partial solution to the problem. Aquaculture is not new, but has been practiced sustainably in various forms for thousands of years. But if not scaled correctly, aquaculture faces many of the same obstacles as does land-based agriculture — pollution, ecosystem disturbance, and landscape degradation — making it hardly a panacea solution.

Ryan Nebeker is a research and policy analyst at Foodprint. Foodprint is an organization dedicated to helping people learn where their food comes from and how it impacts both social and environmental systems. One of Nebeker’s recent reports for Foodprint was a comprehensive analysis of the environmental impact of aquaculture — particularly the large-scale enterprises that he calls “Big Aquaculture.”

Aquaculture has been around for a long time, Nebeker said, and comes in many forms. But when it comes to the idea that aquaculture is a blanket solution for feeding the world, Nebeker has serious doubts.

“When you peel back the hood on how aquaculture really runs, you really run into this idea that it faces a lot of limits,” Nebeker said. “The idea that the ocean is kind of this magical freebie where you can just grow fish doesn’t really work.”

A lot of this has to do with understanding that aquaculture is not a uniform practice — there are a lot of different ways to farm seafood, and it’s important to differentiate among them. According to Nebeker, many of the species that consumers demand are considered “high input” and therefore “high impact.”

These terms refer to where a fish is in the food web. For example, Atlantic salmon is a highly valued commercial fish. But it’s high up in the food chain, meaning that in order to farm it, you have to feed it other fish. The production of fish food is something that drastically increases the environmental impact of farming Atlantic salmon.

“As a result, you end up feeding them quite a bit more than you get back in terms of usable meat,” Nebeker said.

Consuming wild-caught fish that are lower on the food chain, like sardines and anchovies, can help reduce impact. As can farming other species that have positive environmental impacts, such as seaweed and bivalves. Oysters, with their natural capacity for water filtration, give something back to the environment they grow in.

“Just get friendlier with clams, mussels, oysters — they’re so easy to cook,” Nebeker said. “Most people don’t realize they have that really light impact on the environment. And they are delicious.”

Supporting local fishing operations is another good way to reduce impact, Nebeker said, but he also recognizes that for most of the country, there’s no such thing as “local” seafood. In lieu of this, traceability is of high importance.

“One thing that has become a lot easier in the last few years is direct sales from fishermen and fishing cooperatives. Not everybody can walk down to the fish market, per se, but it’s gotten a lot easier to buy direct from fishermen. There’s a verified supply chain, you know they caught it, you know where they caught it.”

Some, like North Carolina’s Walking Fish, serve inland communities in their state. But others flash-freeze their supply and ship it to other parts of the country.

Thanks to the internet, that option is available to more of the country than it used to be. The downside, said Nebeker, is often the cost. But when the cost is low, he said, it may mean someone is cutting corners. Therefore, that cost may not manifest economically, but environmentally or socially.

In his report, Nebeker underscores the importance of viewing the ocean as a shared resource. 

“This is a resource that everyone should be able to use and access,” Nebeker said. “But they should not be able to use it in a way that damages it for other people.”

For regional fishing operations like Walking Fish, the understanding that environmental health is bound up in economic and social welfare is the basis of their business. After running for about 13 years, Walking Fish has a consistent member base that also shares these values.

“We have persevered, and have maintained a member base that benefits from the availability of fresh seafood in Raleigh-Durham but also provides a market for commercial fishermen,” said Callaway. “And for this, I’m very thankful.”

This is third in a series examining the role and sustainability of seafood in a healthy diet and is published in collaboration with North Carolina Health News.

Next in the series: What’s the economic cost of seafood and who can pay it? 

The term “sustainable seafood” gets used a lot with regard to the fishing and aquaculture industries — it’s a phrase that varies in meaning and is used everywhere from policy directives to marketing strategies. But what does it really mean? 

Colloquially, the term “sustainable” is often in reference to environmental impact, with regard to overfishing and making sure that meeting human demands doesn’t destroy ocean ecosystems. Commercial fisheries in the United States are regulated against overfishing, but that doesn’t mean it is not a problem — a growing demand for seafood coupled with climate change related pressures put a lot of strain on the ocean’s capacity to keep producing fish for people to consume.

Meanwhile, the world’s population continues to grow. It is currently at 8 billion and estimated to be 11.2 billion by the end of the century. This growth puts additional pressure on the ocean. Paired with limitations faced by land-based farming, researchers have pointed to the ocean as a possible venue for growable food in light of this trend. In 2020, the United Nations released a report saying that aquaculture had already improved food security globally. Still, this conversation is not without an important caveat — farming seafood is not a panacea solution, and there are many forms of aquaculture that can harm both the environment and local communities instead of benefiting them. 

When it comes to the human diet, the ocean is a potential resource for “good” food. We have long known about the health benefits associated with incorporating fish into your weekly diet — they are abundant in healthy fats, amino acids and other things that help our bodies function well. In the U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ 2020 report of dietary recommendations, a document the agencies release every five years, there’s an emphasis on the importance of consuming high-quality seafood across age groups and demographic populations.

The trouble with that has long been that seafood remains one of the most difficult proteins to acquire at an affordable price point. Economically speaking, the wild-caught seafood industry provides North Carolina with 5,500 jobs and brings in $300 million in value to the state. But when we talk about this economic benefit, to the state and to the country beyond, which communities are being cut out of the picture due to economic or physical access? Who is inadvertently excluded from conversations about “sustainable seafood”?

One understanding of sustainability is that for something to be sustainable, it has to be supported by three pillars of economic, social and environmental strength. When we try to figure out if seafood has a place in a sustainable future, all three of those aspects must be evaluated. In this special series, which is a joint product of North Carolina Health News and Coastal Review, we will look at each of these pillars closely. 

Next, this series will examine the environmental impacts of both aquaculture and commercial fisheries, and how those industries may have to change or adapt in order to be practical in a changing world. We will also examine who can afford to eat seafood, and provides a mosaic look at North Carolina’s subsistence fishers. And finally, the series looks at the social mechanisms of supply and demand, education, labeling and representation. There will be overlap among these three stories, as the issues are impossible to truly extricate from each other. 

This series follows the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, held Sept. 28. The conference sought to investigate how to end hunger, reduce diet-related diseases and disparities and improve nutrition for the country. The only other time that this conference has been held was in 1969, more than 50 years ago. The ways that hunger and nutrition play out in American society have changed dramatically in the last half century. Conversations around climate, conservation, social equity and business have all evolved. 

Seafood, and the important role it plays in our diets and our economies is no exception. The remainder of this series will examine the role the seafood industry plays in North Carolina’s food supply, how it has evolved to this point, and what it will look like in the future.

This is second in a series examining the role and sustainability of seafood in a healthy diet and is published in collaboration with North Carolina Health News. Next in the series: The seafood footprint.

President Joe Biden last week introduced a plan to end hunger in the United States and increase healthy eating and physical activity by 2030.

The 44-page National Strategy On Hunger, Nutrition, And Health identifies what White House officials called “ambitious and achievable actions” the administration will pursue across five pillars: improving food access and affordability, integrating nutrition and health, empowering all consumers to make and have access to healthy choices, supporting physical activity for all and enhancing nutrition and food security research.

The strategy document was released Sept. 27 in conjunction with the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health held Sept. 28, in Washington, D.C.

The conference was the first such event in five decades, as Biden noted in his remarks. Richard Nixon had convened the first White House nutrition conference that “led to a transformational change that has helped millions of Americans live healthier lives for generations,” Biden said.

“Since that time, advances in research and medicine have taught us so much more about nutrition and health,” the president said, adding that he had convened the conference because he believed the advances will make America a stronger and a healthier nation.

Republicans pointed to an ongoing external review of the Food and Drug Administration’s food safety inspection practices, which was requested earlier this year by the agency chief in response to criticism regarding its oversight, and said the conference should have been more bipartisan.

“At a time when food prices continue to soar under record-high inflation rates, and while an external investigation into FDA’s food safety centers—ordered by FDA Commissioner Califf himself—remains underway, it is critical this process involve all appropriate policymakers and stakeholders in any policy goals emerging from the Conference,” top Republicans said Sept. 21 in a letter to the White House.

Key principles focus on access

The White House strategy is based on three key principles: Helping Americans access the food that will keep their families nourished and healthy, providing options and information needed to make healthy dietary choices, and helping more Americans be physically active, Biden explained.

According to the plan, nearly 40 million Americans lack nearby grocery stores with affordable and healthy food options and have no access to transit to get there. Oftentimes, those with limited access to affordable, nutritious food tend to be lower-income and people of color.

In 2021, one in 10 households experienced food insecurity, meaning their access to food was limited by lack of money or other resources. Nearly 4% of households experienced very low food security, which means they were skipping meals regularly or cutting back on how much they ate because they could not afford more food. 

Diet-related diseases are some of the leading causes of death and disability in the U.S., according to the strategy. Findings show that 19 states and two territories have an obesity prevalence at or above 35%, more than double the number of states from 2018. One in 10 Americans have diabetes, one in three will have cancer in their lifetime, and more than four in 10 have high blood pressure, which is linked to heart disease and stroke.

Children in low-income families typically have fewer opportunities to be physically active because of lesser access to safe streets and playgrounds.

Hunger and diet-related diseases are not distributed equally. “These challenges disproportionately impact communities of color, people living in rural areas, people living in territories, people with disabilities, older adults, LGBTQI+ people, military families, and Veterans,” according to the plan.

Biden said the plan “recognizes the critical role that nutrition plays in our health and our healthcare system, and it acknowledges that we have to give families the tools to keep them healthy.” 

The proposed actions under the plan’s five pillars for combating hunger and diet-related illnesses include increasing access to free school meals and food during the summer for more children, updating nutritional labeling, expanding incentives for fruits and vegetables for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, recipients, increasing access to outdoor spaces, and providing more funding to research nutrition and food security policy, mostly on equity and access issues.

To help Americans learn to make healthy food choices, the plan proposes funding public education campaigns, nutrition education and support for Medicare recipients, expanding nutrition education for children and for older adults, offering low-income housing grantees nutritional assistant programs, and supporting regular updates to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Biden said that more than 100 different organizations and businesses have committed more than $8 billion to help reach the plan’s goals.

Commitments include $2.5 billion invested in start-up companies developing solutions to hunger and food insecurity, and more than $4 billion is to be dedicated toward philanthropy to improve access to nutritious food, promote healthy choices and increase physical activity, according to an administration handout.

Among the organizations to commit is the Seafood Nutrition Partnership. The nonprofit focused on building awareness of the health and nutritional benefits of seafood said it will invest a minimum of $280,000 over the next eight years to improve public knowledge of essential nutrition that has been shown to improve brain health. The partnership plans an “eating for brain health” program to educate pregnant individuals on the nutrients required to reduce preterm birth risk and foster healthy early brain development. The group is to conduct research to measure and map Omega-3 fatty acid deficiencies across the country to prioritize the roll-out of its education programs to the areas of greatest need.

The Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation has committed to launch a two-year, $3.5 million effort to increase access to healthy food and grow the “food is medicine” movement in the state. The foundation said it would fund and facilitate partnerships between health care providers and community-based organizations to provide a range of services from food vouchers to medically tailored meals.

Other organizations that have committed include AARP and AARP Foundation to expand research on older adults’ access to SNAP and use the research to improve SNAP enrollment rates for older adults, and the Wave Foundation for an equity and climate marketplace to connect underrepresented food producers – people of color and women – with large-scale food service and retail outlets nationwide.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack called the national strategy a defining moment.

“It sets us on a path to end hunger, enhance nutrition, and improve health outcomes in this country. This strategy compiles recommendations from dozens of listening sessions held over the summer,” he said in a statement.

Public Health Institute Senior Vice President of Programs, Public Policy and Government Relations Matthew Marsom called the plan sustainable and effective and said it was grounded in research, focused on equity, and addresses the systemic causes of hunger, poor nutrition and diet-related chronic disease.

“The White House agenda acknowledges the upstream issues that contribute to food security, especially accessibility and affordability. It calls for addressing poverty by increasing the minimum wage, fully funding the childcare tax credit and expanding the earned income tax credit,” Marsom said. “It also underscores the role of culturally rooted practices as a critical piece of accessibility, including investing in a nutrition workforce that looks like, and comes from the communities it serves.”

The Alliance to End Hunger also commended the plan.

“This strategy is a beacon lighting the road we must now take,” Eric Mitchell, executive director of the Alliance to End Hunger, said in a statement. “We look forward to discussing these ideas and recommendations with the White House and Congress to promote greater equity, improve access to nutritious foods, and ultimately ensure that every American has food on the table every day.”

Developing recommendations

The Task Force on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, a nongovernment, nonpartisan group, had worked through the summer to develop recommendations for the plan. “Informing the White House Conference: Ambitious, Actionable Recommendations to End Hunger, Advance Nutrition, and Improve Health in the United States,” was released Aug. 23 and provided to the White House ahead of the conference.

The task force noted in a press release that its recommendations had not been formally requested nor endorsed by the White House, but organizers applauded Biden’s leadership and the national strategy.

“The work to fix these issues cannot happen in a day, but guided by this national strategy and the non-partisan spirit of the Conference — supported by Congressional leaders from both sides of the aisle — it can and will happen,” organizers said. “We stand ready to support policymakers, industry, academia, advocacy organizations, and the entire broad community of people who are deeply invested in solving these crises in bringing this vision to life; the next phase of work for all of us begins now to ensure continued energy and attention on these critical issues and implementation of this national strategy for systemic change.”

Appeal for bipartisanship

In announcing the plan, Biden stressed the importance of a bipartisan approach to reach its goals. Republicans said they will ensure the result is sound policy but criticized the process.

Top Republicans wrote Sept. 21 to Domestic Policy Council Director Susan Rice asserting that the conference that “began with a promise to engage stakeholders in a bipartisan process has deteriorated into a partisan gathering lacking the direction and clarity needed to drive significant, long-lasting change.”

For the conference policy recommendations to be considered bipartisan, Republicans wrote, the White House should have meaningfully engaged a variety of stakeholders, including congressional colleagues from both sides of the aisle at all stages.

The letter was signed by Rep. Glenn “G.T.” Thompson, R-Pa., who sits on the Agriculture Committee; Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., who sits on Education and Labor Committee; Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., from the Energy and Commerce Committee; James Comer R-Ky., of the Oversight and Reform Committee; and Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., from the Subcommittee on Agriculture Appropriation.

The Republicans promised “an active oversight role, given our seats on committees of jurisdiction over the recommendations likely to stem from the Conference as Congress and the administration deliberate how to move forward to ensure we are all supporting the goals of ending hunger and improving nutrition in ways that make sound policy sense for all Americans.”

This is the first in a series examining the role and sustainability of seafood in a healthy diet and is published in collaboration with North Carolina Health News. Next in the series: What does “sustainable seafood” mean?