"The school is out of food, please bring your own in the future." "There are no vegetables in the school canteen. Please eat some fruit instead of the school canteen." "The school has no tableware. Grab and eat with your hands"...If you don't tell you this scene In which country did the scene take place, do you think they came from a third world country? However, this is what happened in the United States, the world's number one power, in primary and secondary schools.
A long report on September 28 in the New York Times disclosed the "difficulties in eating" that has been commonly faced by elementary and middle schools across the United States. Due to problems in the supply chain and lack of labor, the most basic task of providing food to students is becoming increasingly complicated in the United States. Schools all over the United States have shortages of food raw materials and even disposable tableware and other canteen necessities.
School officials say they are eager to provide meals for students-many students rely on the food they eat at school as an important source of daily nutrition, and sometimes the only source. However, many educators expect that supply chain problems will only worsen in the coming months.
North Kansas City, Missouri School Food and Nutrition Services Director Jenna Knut is increasingly worried that three large food distributors said they would stop providing food to 21,500 students in her area Later, she will not have enough food to feed these students. Therefore, Knut's colleagues regularly visit the local Sam's Club and the restaurant supplies warehouse, where they "sweep up" the frozen products. Knut said that many of these foods do not meet the nutritional guidelines issued by the federal government. Although they are not unhealthy, their sodium and fat content is much higher than that of products usually purchased in the region.
But Knut is still "buying as much food as possible",She even "begged" local dealers and suppliers to sign contracts with them.
This is not an isolated case. Although the situation varies from place to place, the food shortage in American primary and secondary schools has reached the point of "three noes".
First of all, some school district tableware is gone.
The lack of disposable spoons, forks, and knives forced some schools to save on tableware. In the Dallas independent school district, the school now mainly provides "fingertip food" (that is, food that can be eaten without tableware) for breakfast on Tuesday and Thursday to reduce the demand for plastic tableware. The area usually stocks tableware for about a month, and now the supply has been reduced to 9 days. This made the entire area only "fingertip food" even for all Tuesday lunches.
Students’ lunch will be finger carrot sticks and apple slices instead of salad and apple puree . Moreover, it no longer offers pasta and meatballs , but instead offers fried chicken fillets-just grab and eat with your hands.
▲The "fingertip food" that can be eaten without tableware has changed from the original snack to the main meal of the students (New York Times website in the United States)
This area is responsible for food and children Michael Rosenberg, Executive Director of Nutrition Services, said: "I have been in this business for 30 years, and I have never seen such a severe chaos in the supply chain.
Secondly, the hot lunch in some school districts is gone.
Richmond Public Schools in Virginia have replaced their hot lunches with ready-to-eat meals this year. And worried about the spread of the virus.
13-year-old Maggie Cobb is an 8th grade student at Binford Middle School in Richmond. She said that she used to eat two or three meals a week at school. She especially likes school. Pizza—it wasn’t a quick-frozen pizza at the time. But when she ate lunch at school again this month, she found an unappealing sandwich with a piece of deli meat she couldn’t distinguish, she decided not to Count on the school to provide food again.
Her description of the sandwich is: "It looks disgusting.
▲American elementary school students are eating lunch, and the little girl is about to put in her mouth is the classic American food "grilled cheese sandwich." (New York Times website)
Man Public School Nutrition Services Director Stacy Coppen said that officials in Sao Paulo have begun to stock up grilled cheese sandwiches and are ready to replace them in time. A few weeks ago, the workers who made burgers for lunch no longer had any specialties. To make hamburger bread, I had to switch to regular bread.
Anchorage School District Student Nutrition Senior Director Andrew Mergens said,Seven schools in the district cannot provide hot food because there are not enough workers to prepare the food. Instead, the area offers pre-packaged lunches that can be stored for a long time.
Finally, some school districts even consider canceling all lunches.
In the free public school of , Missouri, school district officials issued a notice on September 13 to encourage parents to bring their own lunch.
The notice read: "If it is not a burden for your family to let students bring meals from home, then we will encourage this option as a short-term requirement."
this question It stems from the convergence of a series of factors, many of which are related to the new crown epidemic. On the surface, this is a supply imbalance caused by poor supply chains, labor shortages and rising upstream raw material prices.
▲Students are lining up to get packed lunches instead of hot meals. (New York Times website)
Food distributors and manufacturers are troubled by labor shortages. They say there are not enough people to drive trucks, transport products from warehouses, or work on assembly lines. The new crown epidemic has exacerbated the shortage of truck drivers.
said Susanna Rajzy, CEO of Ginsberg Foods in Hudson, New York,Due to lack of sufficient drivers and warehouse workers, the company had to abandon delivery to approximately 80 school districts. Even with the schools that continue to work with, the company had to shorten the delivery time.
Cindy Jones, assistant director of catering services for the Olathe School District in Kansas, said that last month, after a meal delivery delay, the school there had no vegetables for two days. The district had to encourage students to eat more fruits.
The shortage of workers has exacerbated the problem, causing both food distributors and manufacturers to be hit hard.
Buffalo 's Fortune Company is a manufacturer that supplies food to more than 2,000 school districts. The company's senior vice president Kevin Spratt said it is difficult for the company to recruit workers. There are as many as 50 job vacancies in several of the company's factories.
In addition to the scarcity of raw materials and packaging materials, the shortage of labor also makes it difficult for the company to complete orders. Spratt said the company has suspended production of about 15 products that it normally sells to schools, although it has been able to provide alternative products. Because, Spratt said: "Our factory does not have enough labor to meet the demand."
▲The staff of the school’s dining department is preparing meals for students (The New York Times website in the United States)
The federal government responded to this by issuing a series of exemptions to enable schools to respond more flexibly to federal nutrition guidelines. On September 15, the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued a new exemption, stipulating that if the school’s meal plan fails to meet the federal nutrition guidelines due to supply chain issues,Then they will be exempt from financial penalties. It also increased the rate of reimbursement for school food expenses.
However, the government's series of exemption orders did not have the desired effect, because behind this predicament are intertwined with deep-seated factors in US macroeconomic policy and even diplomacy.
Since last year, in response to the impact of the epidemic, the United States has implemented unprecedented fiscal stimulus policies and continued to maintain monetary easing. The Trump administration launched 2.2 trillion and 900 billion U.S. dollars of COVID-19 rescue plans in March 2020 and January 2021, respectively, and the Biden administration passed about 2 trillion U.S. dollars in relief bills in March and August, respectively. And the "Infrastructure and Employment Act" of approximately US$1 trillion. The Federal Reserve, which has always been highly wary of inflation, has also been highly cooperative and has repeatedly postponed its exit from the monetary easing path for fear that tightening expectations will cause fluctuations in the capital market and impact the recovery of the real economy.
Under massive stimulus policies and a loose monetary environment, the US economy has achieved a rapid recovery and rebound in the short term, but there are also huge hidden dangers that have not been seen for many years.
Macroscopically, the inflationary pressure facing the US economy is increasing, and the inflation rate has reached the highest level in more than a decade.
At the micro level, it is too easy for Americans to receive various anti-epidemic subsidies. A series of rent exemptions, food subsidies, and living allowance policies have made many Americans find that the income from going out to do short jobs is not as good as receiving subsidies at home , That simply doesn't work anymore.
What’s worse is that in the face of the epidemic, the U.S. government did not seriously face up to and reflect on the ineffectiveness of its own epidemic prevention and control policies.They did not join hands with other countries to fight the epidemic, but were busy throwing the pot, political hype, delaying the anti-epidemic fighters, and ultimately "lifting a stone to hit one's own feet", resulting in a slow domestic resumption of work and a sluggish international supply chain.
Unfortunately, the domestic epidemic in the United States has not yet healed, and the road to economic recovery is full of thorns. Even a lunch for the children in school is difficult to guarantee, but the top priority in the minds of the US government and politicians is still How to "contain" China. The United States is so big that it can no longer fit a child's dining table.
Source: Reference News
Editor: Zhang Luoluo
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