Yesterday Walmart announced a major initiative to provide customers with healthier and more affordable food choices. First Lady Michelle Obama, whose Let's Move campaign is collaborating with Walmart, called it "a huge victory for folks all across this country." What do you think?
In short, the five elements of Walmart's Nutrition Initiative are as follows:
- Reformulating thousands of everyday packaged food items by 2015, reducing sodium, sugars, and trans fats.
- Making healthier choices more affordable, especially fresh fruits and vegetables.
- Developing strong criteria for a front-of-package seal to help consumers identify healthier options.
- Providing solutions to address food deserts by building stores in underserved communities.
- Increasing charitable support for nutrition programs.
(Read the full announcement here.)
Our reactions have run the gamut, from cynicism to hopeful optimism. While our imagined perfect world looks very different from a Walmart-dominated one, the reality is that millions of Americans rely on Walmart. As the largest retailer of grocery products in the U.S., the company has the power to create real change not just for their customers, but the entire industry.
Since the announcement, there has been a slurry of posts from food and nutrition writers, many of whom also seem conflicted. Echoing our own thoughts, Grist's Tom Philpott points out that "To date, [Walmart's] dominance hasn't had a benign effect on the food system .... Public health, too, has suffered from the ubiquity of Walmart's superstores and their bounty of cheap, processed goods."
Public health expert Marion Nestle is also skeptical about Walmart establishing "its own nutrition criteria for judging its own products" but thinks "the most important of these initiatives is the one to reduce the price of fruits and vegetables."
However, over at The Atlantic, Corby Kummer reports that it doesn't sound like Walmart will actually be lowering prices on produce it already sells. Kummer's piece is definitely worth reading for a more in-depth look at the five parts of the initiative. Ultimately, he concludes that "Whatever you think about Walmart, it looks to be using its clout to help people who don't have the time, money, or opportunity to eat better."
What are your thoughts on Walmart's big announcement?
Related: Hold the Phone: Walmart to Start Carrying Local Produce
(Image: Flickr member mjb84 licensed under Creative Commons)
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Hah, I find this hilarious. The huge wal-mart in my community only sells the highest calorie/sugar/fat laden processed foods. In the many food isles, you will not find organic anything, no produce, no cage free eggs,or healthful snacks or dinner options, it's really rather appalling. So now they're going to force manufacturers to change what they make? How about they even start with offering healthy alternatives AT ALL. Something not from Nabisco or Kraft or General Mills. Even a bag of sun chips in the snack isle would be a sad start. Geez.
Meh. It's nice to get some sodium, sugar and trans fats out of their products, but the bigger question is what will replace these ingredients. And, as long as you're eating 'products,' you're not eating 'food' which is the bigger problem.
It's also nice that they're aiming to make fresh f+v more affordable, but OTOH, are they just going to squeeze farmers even harder or -- more likely -- just import more from China which has such lax standards it would comical if it weren't so scary.
Overall, it's a step in the right direction I suppose, but I think lulling consumers into a false-sense of health security by missing the point entirely. I see this more as a marketing move than anything.
I hate to say it but I do buy a majority of my groceries at Walmart. Ours has a pretty good selection of health options including organic produce cage free eggs. The meat I buy elsewhere if I can because well I trust where the meat comes from elsewhere. I live in a small town where the actual grocery store cost so much more. And they have what Walmart has as well.
Walmart is one of the most deplorable companies in this country. It bullies its way into communities (and just to be fair...so does Whole Foods). They have been sued in 32+ states for awful employment practices. And they feed the American fantasy that we are entitled to have access to everything and that it should be as cheap as possible.
In other countries, the crap food is just as outrageously priced as the good food, but that's not what makes people make healthier choices. It's societal. We can make organic apples as cheap as we want but the shoppers at Walmart who load up their carts with pre-packaged, processed junk every week and feed it to their kids are NOT going to buy apples because they are cheap. They buy it because they are lazy and feel entitled to stay that way. I know this sounds classist, but I grew up in a low income household and watched my mother work like crazy to put good food on our plates every day. It wasn't about affording it...it was about WANTING to do it right.
I think it's so dumb when grocery stores segregate the "healthy food" to its own section. Just put crackers with crackers, "milks" with milks, etc. Then again, I get pissed off because mineral water and water are never on the same aisle either.
http://www.peopleofwalmart.com
Need I say more?
I think it is great news. Wal-Mart moves mountains.
But I still don't want to shop one and am glad they haven't been able to build in my community.
Is Walmart doing this because the market is dictating it?
@ spicygyoza- Haha! Seen this before, and its funny, scary, and just sad all at once.
I am overall hesitant to be optimistic about this. I am hardly a fan of Wal-mart. Actually, I think Wal-mart is evil. They sell products that are produced cheaply in China, in situations that are deplorable. The living situations and compensations of the workers making those products is heartbreaking. All the while, the heads of Wal-mart are making big bucks. But, I guess that is the American way. Or something like that.
Are they going to support local farmers? Doubt it. Most of all, I am concerned about their idea of addressing "food deserts". I live in Philly, with no "real" grocery store in my neighborhood. However, I do have a farmer's market in my area for many months of the year. And, I have other options available (thank god for TJ & Reading Terminal) that give me access to local and seasonal foods. I can see big bad Wal-mart coming in and potentially pushing these wonderful farmer's market out.
Perhaps I am paranoid, but then again, Wal-mart does have this reputation.
While I agree with some of the points other commenters have made about walmart being a bit of a big store bully, I do have to say it would be nice for people to get more affordable good for you food, and I don't mean junk food. The produce prices in the markets where I live are out of control, and our local walmarts dont carry fresh food, other than the packaged junk food kind. You shouldn't have to be a millionaire just to eat healthy.
I've never shopped in a Walmart and don't intend to; I live in a city that prides itself on not having a Walmart. But enough about me - for all those people without easy, affordable access to healthier foods, this can make a difference. Good for them. I shall not speculate on Walmart's motives (of course, it's market driven).
Unfortunately, I live in an area that has been over-run by large chain stores so that the local businesses and shops really do not stand a chance, thus they not exist. I do shop at Wal-mart, and I am hopeful that there recent announcement provides some change. I actually can get organic products, but the selection is slim.
I love it when those of us who can afford organic milk and cage free eggs act as though the majority of the country can as well. Fact is, walmart exists in many areas where a square meal includes fast food or junk food of some kind. A lot of people rely on the low prices walmart has, and if they're making an effort to make even healthier options more widely available, then that's great news. Maybe healthier for you is cage free eggs, and organic produce, but for a lot of Americans, healthier would simply be fresh (real) eggs, and fruits and veggies period. We can't all afford farmers market fare, for many different reasons. It'll be good to make real food more affordable for everyone.
Hey, bluepuppybites, if you continue to shop at walmart and not your local grocery store, soon the only store you will have to shop at is walmart and then they will raise their prices! That is the walmart way. Support your local stores!!!!!
I can not agree more heartily with WannaBeBeachBum on this. It is very easy to give your opinion on eating organic and healthy when you have easy access to such fare and the paycheck to afford it. As a military family, we're currently living in a community with two options - Wal-Mart and a chain grocery store. It's a no brainer for me - I shop at Wal-Mart because it's affordable and allows me to still set aside money at the end of the month. Sorry if that's selfish.
Our Wal-Mart followed through on their recent promise to provide more local produce and it has been wonderful. We're a very healthy family and I'm not purchasing the processed foods they're discussing now. That being said, it can only be beneficial to small town America and communities like this one where the average family struggles to provide food, let alone healthy, fresh food.
Be grateful if you have the ability to be so choosy when grocery shopping.
Ahhhgg, I reallyreallyreally don't want to defend Wal-Mart, but when I went back home for the holidays, I started to crave kale with a fiery passion, and surprisingly enough, the only grocery store in the whole town that carried it was the local Wal-Mart (Also! It was cheaper than I can get it here in Brooklyn!). So, yeah, I guess if Wal-Marts are going to be around, I would be pretty pumped about a legit expansion of fresh food.
Get better health insurance for your workers walmart, or give it to them sooner in the first place!
Ok well I'd love to support my local store but when I'm paying a dollar more on everything then that's $50 less that I am able to spend. I make every meal for my family we don't eat out we don't eat junk things like that aren't allowed in our house. We are on one income so I have to budget like crazy! I do shop there a couple times a month and a "local" store that is 20 minutes away because I love it. I don't like wal mart anymore than the rest of you but I don't have very many options.