The role of government in implementing good nutritional practice.

M/rY remarks today represent neither the policies of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare nor viewpoints of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, of which I am scientific director. Rather, my comments will reflect my training in the discipline of pediatrics and my experience in the field of nutrition. The title of this panel is "The Role of Government and Industry in Implementing Good Nutritional Practice." There is a tacit implication that some positive action by government or industry, acting alone or in concert, can somehow improve the eating habits of Americans. While this is undoubtedly correct, there is an unspoken assumption that the role of government in improving nutrition lies in the field of education or regulation and that of industry in manufacture or distribution. Each may be correct, but I maintain that the root of evil is poverty, and that through tolerance of poverty we have exposed our people, especially our children, to malnutrition. The role of government must lie, at least in part, in an attack on poverty and malnutrition through economic activity, through enactment of the Family Assistance Plan now before Congress, or by implementing the commodity-distribution and food-stamp plans. There is a role for education in nutrition, but it must be viewed against the backdrop of the larger national problem: poverty. My remarks will deal largely with the issues as they affect children, who must be our prime concern. Then I shall propose an interaction between government and industry in the area of education in nutrition. Within the past four years numerous coordinated campaigns have awakened the conscience of Americans to the presence of malnutrition