The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention today released a report indicating that a “Majority of Americans not Meeting Recommendations for Fruit and Vegetable Consumption.”

From the press release: “The Healthy People 2010 objectives aim for at least 75 percent of Americans to eat the recommended two or more daily servings of fruit, and for at least 50 percent of Americans to eat the recommended three or more servings of vegetables daily. However, CDC surveys indicate that only 33 percent of adults meet the recommendation for fruit consumption and 27 percent get the recommended servings of vegetables. The statistics are even worse for high school students – 32 percent report eating at least two servings of fruit daily and 13 percent say they eat at least three servings of vegetables each day.”

The State Indicator Report on Fruits and Vegetable, 2009 is available here.

If ever there were a time for Neighborhood Nutrition Centers, the time is now.

This has been an incredible day of chance meetings, and planned meetings – beginning with a meeting with a community organizer on the south side regarding the work I am doing for the property tax initiative I am also engaged in.

From there, I went on to meet with Beth Gunzel at Growing Home, Inc. to discuss utilizing some intern assistance at Growing Home to start looking at the Englewood demographics, and help determine a pilot project location. Coincidentally, I ran into Gaston Armour at Growing Home, who is the Strategic Coordinator of the Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness for the State of Illinois. We had met on a previous occasion, and I have sent him materials on the project. He began discussing with me a possible location, a DHS building which was just recently closed down. We will be following up on that after Iowa.

Also at Growing Home was the project manager Orrin Williams – who provided me with contact information to a local alderman’s office. Orrin spoke to them about the project, and they say they are interested in discussing it with me.

After Growing Home, it was a stop at the Jane Addams Hull House Kitchen “Re-Thinking Soup” program. 60 gallons of soup made with a bag of rice and some celery form the store – and the rest from the Jane Addams own garden. It was wonderfully rich, as was the program.

The featured speaker, Rochelle Davis, Founding Executive Director of the Healthy School Campaign, spoke about the many issues and programs tied in to the Healthy Schools Campaign – noting that childhood obesity has tripled in the past thirty years. I’m very interested in the work of HSC – and hope to explore developing possibilities with their work.

I also – on the chance meeting side of things – sat next to urban beekeeper Michael Thompson, of the Chicago Honey Co-op. I had a great time at the co-op this summer for their Open House, in conjunction with the City Farm. Ask me some day to tell you the story of going from the Chicago Honey Co-op to the City Farm… suffice to say, bicycling in the city is faster!

Lots to think about this afternoon, as I went to Uptown – and walked a friend’s dog.