Hello Governor,
I believe that society and government regulations can help aid the fight against the obesity epidemic in our state. I don’t think that all the blame for obesity falls on the individuals with the disease. There are many different external factors that play a role in this problem.
I think that the biggest culprit in the obesity epidemic is the inaccessibility of healthy and nutritious foods for the everyday consumer. I have noticed that it very hard to find healthy foods when you are on the go. The foods that are readily available at workplaces, schools, and homes all have high caloric density and low nutritional value.
This can be changed by incentivizing schools, businesses, and stores to sell more healthy and nutritious foods. This could be done by giving organizations that sell more healthful foods property tax reductions and business grants. Tax reductions can also be given to food processing companies that produce more nutritious foods.
Vice versa, I think there could be a tax put on unhealthy foods such as sodas and junk foods. This would cause both consumers and producers to stop buying and creating foods that are low in nutritious ingredients. The money from these taxes could go into making healthy foods more accessible to people and lessening the cost of producing them.
More research could be put into finding ways to create healthy foods that have a longer shelf life or do not need refrigeration. I think a major barrier to people getting nutritious foods is that they take longer to prepare or are hard to find. There could be more research in finding ways to make nutritious choices easier to access.
I also believe that nutrition education can play a major role in improving the obesity epidemic. Even if there were front of package labels describing the nutrition facts, many people wouldn’t know what they mean or how this nutrition information plays a role into their diet. Also, family life and how a person grew up plays a role in how they eat. I don’t know if putting the calorie information on packages will make that much of a difference.
We can try to limit the number of fast-food restaurants through zoning laws, however, I do not think that this is the best solution. I don’t think taking away certain foods will cause people to eat less. People still need to eat and will just turn to other ultra-processed alternatives in the grocery store.