WORKPLACE WELLNESS GUIDE. Read how to start doing it in your office

The first step may be to form a wellness committee of employees who care about this topic and are motivated to make some changes within the office setting. What types of changes may these be? Assessing any vending machines in the office is a good place to start. How many healthy choices, such as baked chips, nuts, seeds, dried fruit, etc., do you see? Contact your vendor to determine what other options you have, reduce your supply of unhealthy choices and replace them with some better-for-you snacks. You could even label these snacks as such to produce an even bigger impact. Putting a policy in place stating the need for healthy vending will make this change sustainable and make your staff aware of the changes that were made and more importantly, why they were made. Next, think about your in-office meetings and events. Are healthy choices available when meals are served to your staff or snacks brought in for special occasions? This is another area where a policy can be effective. Only allowing for approved, healthy snack options during special events or occasions and ensuring that at least one healthy option is provided when meals are served is promoting the importance of health to your staff. In no way is this an ask to remove all unhealthy food from your place of work. Simply, this is an ask to allow for employees to easily make a healthy choice — by making sure that these choices are always available. http://www.limaohio.com/news/health-home_top-news/51019879/Making-healthy-choices-at-work

Good News! Wellness now a School Policy for Students, Teachers & Parents of Newton District

Board policy 504.11 details how the battle should be fought on many fronts, from nutrition education of students and parents to meal time guidelines, providing a summer meal program and amounts of physical activity. That’s a sign of progress for schools, including the Newton Community School District, which held the first reading of an updated wellness policy at its Dec. 22 board meeting. Schools were fighting much different battles against poor nutrition 10 or 20 years ago, but at the Dec. 22 meeting, food service supervisor Cristy Croson had many positive items to report about nutrition in the district.Source: http://www.newtondailynews.com/2015/01/05/school-wellness-policy-addresses-junk-food-other-concerns/a3j1kpa/

UPDATE: New Diet Guidelines to Cut Environment Cost for Better Health of Americans

WASHINGTON (AP) — For years, the government has been issuing guidelines about healthy eating choices. Now, a panel that advises the Agriculture Department is ready to recommend that you be told not only what foods are better for your own health, but for the environment as well. That means that when the latest version of the government's dietary guidelines comes out, it may push even harder than it has in recent years for people to choose more fruits, vegetables, nuts, whole grains and other plant-based foods — at the expense of meat. The beef and agriculture industries are crying foul, saying an environmental agenda has no place in what has always been a practical blueprint for a healthy lifestyle. The advisory panel has been discussing the idea of sustainability in public meetings, indicating that its recommendations, expected early this year, may address the environment. A draft recommendation circulated last month said a sustainable diet helps ensure food access for both the current population and future generations. A dietary pattern higher in plant-based foods and lower in animal-based foods is "more health promoting and is associated with lesser environmental impact than is the current average U.S. diet," the draft said Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/02/diet-guidelines-environment_n_6409228.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592