Let’s Move: Michelle Obama Moving On Up the Wal-Mart Aisles

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As part of Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move initiative the first lady took her campaign to the aisles of Wal-Mart. Her message to the world’s largest retailer:  to provide healthier food products with less sugar and salt, and to entirely remove trans-fats from their shelves over the next five years.

Michelle Obama in the news

In this latest televised You Tube news video Michelle Obama orates from the produce section of a Washington Wal-Mart and delivers her speech. She demands that Wal-Mart president Bill Simon pledge that within the next five years Wal-Mart will remove all products containing unhealthy trans-fats from their warehouse, stock their grocery shelves with products containing dramatically lower sugar and salt content and pump up their fresh produce section, all the while maintaining Wal-Mart’s competitively low pricing.

Attributing America’s childhood obesity crisis to the lack of selection of fresh produce in the more poverty-stricken states combined with the escalating costs of nutritious foods, the first lady hopes that this new Wal-Mart measure will encourage parents to make more health-conscious food choices when shopping for their families.

Let’s Move in the White House

Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move project is part of a national attempt to address childhood obesity, which has more than tripled in 30 years; approximately 1 out of 3 children between the ages of 6 and 19 in the US are obese.

Health risks associated with childhood obesity include:

  • Heart disease
  • Type 2 diabetes
  • Asthma
  • Sleep apnea
  • Social discrimination
  • High cholesterol
  • High blood pressure

“In the end, as First Lady, this isn’t just a policy issue for me. This is a passion. This is my mission. I am determined to work with folks across this country to change the way a generation of kids thinks about food and nutrition.”

– First Lady Michelle Obama, on Childhood Obesity Task Force report

Wal-Mart CEO Bill Simon heartily accepted the first lady’s challenge, replying, “No family should have to choose between food that is healthier for them and food they can afford.”

Wal-Mart pledges not only to cut their prices on produce and eliminate high sugar and sodium; the retailer will also step up on their charitable support for various healthy food programs aimed at educating the public about health and fitness.


Sources:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/01/20/eveningnews/main7266890.shtml

http://thestir.cafemom.com/food_party/115344/why_is_michelle_obama_in

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daniel-krotz/one-big-store_b_813201.html

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20110126/OPINION01/301260071