Fruit & Veggie Report Card Part 3

Fruit & Veggies Report Card Part 3. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. Unless you are a vegetarian fruits and vegetables have most always been relegated to the side of the plate. Efforts by many produce groups have been pushing to have these side dishes moved to the center of the plate. Elizabeth Pivonka, President and CEO of the Produce for Better Health Foundation says a new report from the National Fruit & Vegetable Alliance shows some of the down sides. PIVONKA: We had three areas that we gave a "C" where there was some progress towards our goal. One was restaurant menus, one was school food and the third was CDC budget. Restaurant menus we're basically seeing greater availability of fruits and vegetables on menus. The downside on restaurants is that of all the fruit that people consume only 3% of it is consumed from restaurants and then of all the vegetables only 15% of it is consumed in restaurants. She says with schools even though some progress has been made it is important to keep working. PIVONKA: The "D's" where we had minimal progress in one area was advertising of unhealthy foods to children. There has been a slight reduction in advertising of unhealthy foods, not a lot but at least it was a slight reduction. We also gave children's fruit and vegetable consumption a "D". We're still seeing that 88% of children don't eat the recommended amount of fruit and 92% don't eat the recommended amount of vegetables. Other "D's" included disease prevention & wellness in healthcare and a "D" to agriculture policy alignment with health policy. Tomorrow we finish the report card. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.