City Harvest Programs » Nutrition Education

Children

Nearly 350,000 children visit an emergency food program each year in New York City. Research in the United States has linked hunger and food insecurity with tangible impacts on the health, mental and psychological well-being, and cognitive and academic functioning of children. In addition, food habits that are learned as a child can lead to nutrition-related problems later in life. Obese children are twice as likely as non-obese children to become obese adults.

According to a recent study, one in three children born in the year 2000 will develop diabetes and the rate is even higher (1 in 2) for Latino and African American communities. If these trends continue, today’s children may face a shorter life expectancy than those of us who came before. In New York City in particular, more than 40% of Head Start children are overweight or obese as compared to 31% nationally. By the age of four there is a 1 in 3 chance that a child will be obese if s/he lives in NYC and is from a low-income family.

Childhood Nutrition Programs at City Harvest

• Fruit Bowl • Cooking Matters

Fruit Bowl

Fruit Bowl combines deliveries of healthy foods with a uniquely designed program to teach children life-long healthy eating habits. Through this program, City Harvest provides regular deliveries of fresh fruit and lowfat dairy products to daycare programs that serve preschool children and to afterschool programs. Because the decision to make healthy choices most often rests with parents, City Harvest has developed a Family Curriculum to help parents and their children learn to cook healthy meals together.

My dream is for healthy food to be hip and cool, and seen as the norm … for parents, family and staff to be excited about fresh foods and see food preparation as easy and fun.

– Staff member at The Children’s Aid Society Bronx Early Childhood Center, a Fruit Bowl agency

It is … wonderful to see kids enjoy fresh fruit as a snack. The kids are more energetic, engaged and ready to learn now that the quality of our daily snack has improved considerably this year. In addition to the snack, I’ve also received nothing but positive feedback regarding the nutrition education programming.

– Afterschool Program Director at Community League of the Heights, a Fruit Bowl agency

Get Involved

City Harvest is seeking graduate and undergraduate nutrition and dietetic students to facilitate Fruit Bowl games and activities with children. Learn more.