New Market for Farmers
Means Better Food for Kids

Nearly 200 elementary school children in Santa Monica, Calif., are choosing salad for lunch – thanks to nearby farmers markets.

Farmers who sell their harvest at the farmers markets in Santa Monica deliver produce to McKinley Elementary School twice a week. Parents come to school before lunch each day to help prepare the fruits and vegetables for presentation in a salad bar.

School officials say the number of students who eat at the salad bar tripled in the program’s first month, with about a third of the 500 students at the school now partaking of the healthful alternative to the usual school lunch fare. "It has had such a great total effect on our school in terms of healthy eating," Wendy Wax, the school’s principal, told reporters at a news conference held in October to "celebrate the success" of the program.

The fruit and salad bar program also creates a new market for local farmers, more than a dozen of whom participate, organizers say.

Organizations that helped set up the program include the Southland Farmers Market Association and the Food Security Project at Occidental College and the University of California, Los Angeles.

For more information, contact Lucia Sanchez at (310) 822-7824.