It is truly pathetic how little we value child nutrition in this country.

The federal school lunch program was designed in 1946 not just to feed kids but also to prop up agribusiness. The USDA buys surplus meat and cheese and passes on massive quantities of these cheap commodities to schoolchildren. About 20 percent of school lunches are these USDA freebies. When the beef and dairy industries lobby the government to buy up more excess product, the USDA obliges.

With more than four billion lunches served every year, the school lunch program competes with the nation’s fast food chains as a delivery system for fat-laden, beef-and-cheese-heavy meals.

As a result, at school and on the weekends, low-income kids consume massive quantities of corn syrup and meat and dairy products loaded with chemicals, hormones, and antibiotics. And industry lobbyists want to make sure it stays that way.

Programs like the one at my kids’ school, pushed by farm-to-school advocates, help introduce kids to some of the fresh produce that is missing from their diets. It’s not a panacea. But just introducing kids to vegetables does make a difference. Nutritionists know that kids need to be exposed to a new food many times before they adopt it. That’s why schools, which often serve both breakfast and lunch five days a week, are a good place for kids to learn about healthy eating.

In tiny Chilton, Wisconsin, Diane Chapeta, an inspired food service director, has changed her program to buy exclusively from local farms. As a result, both the children and the farming community are thriving. One beef farm that contracts with the school has doubled in size. Creative local efforts have also transformed the school lunch programs in Berkeley, California, and Boulder, Colorado.

But we need change on a much larger scale.

As America gets fatter, the biggest losers are at the bottom end of the income scale. The gap in life expectancy between the richest and poorest Americans is now 20 percent.

There’s no way around it: Access to healthy food is a social justice issue, as well as one of decency and sustainability.

It’s time we took responsibility for the health of our kids.

This is but a short excerpt Ruth Conniff’s editorial in the November issue of The Progressive. To read the entire commentary and to subscribe to The Progressive for only $14.97 for a year, simply subscribe now by clicking here.