Recent activities of public agencies to assure healthful diets for Americans

In the United States, public agencies long have been involved in providing information about food and nutrition. Over the years, however, the nature of that involvement has shifted. Initially the emphasis was on practical information about agriculture and home economics. Gradually emphasis has shifted to concerns about malnutrition and, more recently, to concerns about overconsumption and associated health problems. This paper reviews some of the food and nutrition-related activities of public agencies and summarizes some recent concerns related to nutrition "recommendations", "goals", and "guidelines". Two key publications related to nutrition issues are: 1) "Nutrition and Your Health: Dietary Guidelines for Americans," published jointly by United States Department of Agriculture and Department of Health and Human Services and 2) "Toward Healthful Diets," from the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences. One of the guidelines in the former publication tends to encourage the dairy industry to orient toward reducing consumption of milk fat. In contrast, the analysis in the latter publication tends to encourage adoption of an approach to promote nutrition education and marketing programs without necessarily reducing consumption of milk fat. The approach of dairy industry would differ depending upon which guidelines were adopted.