Although the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has effectively reduced hunger, the program lacks nutrition standards and places no restrictions on the types of food that can be purchased with benefits, writes Angela Rachidi, a Rowe Scholar in poverty studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
SNAP households use the benefits to purchase unhealthy foods, leading to poor diet quality, disease, and premature deaths among participants, Rachidi wrote in a column published by The Hill.
Obesity and diet-related disease are public health crises in the U.S., with 40% of adults and 20% of children being obese and low-income groups suffering disproportionately.
- SNAP has the potential to improve nutrition among low-income Americans by adding nutrition standards and fundamentally altering the dietary habits of households.
- Recent comments by the Secretary of Agriculture, Thomas Vilsack, reflect an unwillingness to meet these challenges and introduce nutrition standards to SNAP.
- SNAP's nutrition education program is reportedly ineffective, and the healthy incentive program has not reduced unhealthy food purchases.
- Congress needs to establish nutrition standards in SNAP, authorize restrictions on unhealthy foods, and compel retailers to market healthy foods to consumers as part of the 2023 Farm Bill, Rachidi wrote.
SNAP is the largest nutrition assistance program in the U.S., providing an average of $490 monthly to over 22 million low-income households to help them afford healthier diets.
