Educational poster partnership to promote produce

The International Fresh Produce Association and The Foundation for Fresh Produce are partnering with Kids Eat in Color to distribute produce-focused educational posters to pediatric-facing health care providers across the country.

Kids Eat in Color provides evidence-based strategies and information on child nutrition and feeding, according to a news release. In addition to courses and community resources, it has a social media community to amplify its efforts. With over 2 million Instagram followers, Kids Eat in Color founder and registered dietitian Jennifer Anderson is a resource in helping families from first bite of solid food through elementary-aged nutrition needs.

“I am thrilled to be partnering with the International Fresh Produce Association to make the ‘How to talk about Fruits and Veggies’ poster available in pediatrician offices across the country,” Anderson said. “By providing information about what fruits and veggies do in our bodies, we can help kids learn about their health in a way that protects their relationship with food and their body."

The poster, which features age-appropriate ways to talk with children about fruits and vegetables, will be co-branded with Kids Eat in Color and The Foundation for Fresh Produce’s Have A Plant logo, directing pediatric-facing providers and families to fruitsandveggies.org recipes and resources, the release said. IFPA will fund and facilitate the distribution of posters to health care offices. Kids Eat in Color announced the partnership and linked to the request page on its social media channels last week.

The firm said the initiative has been popular since the posting, with more than 3,500 posters requested from over 570 different providers in 45 U.S. states and eight countries. The goal of providing direct education to pediatricians and the families they serve to help build healthy habits from an early age is linked to IFPA’s Industry Commitments established during the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health, the release said. One of the commitments was to produce and disseminating culturally informed, consumer-friendly resources to improve the public’s nutrition literacy.

“It’s well-known that establishing healthful eating patterns at an early age defines consumers’ habits into their adulthoods,” said Cathy Burns, CEO for IFPA and the foundation. “While we are faced with mounting economic and human costs of diet-related disease, it’s also known that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables is one of the simplest ways to ensure physical well-being. We are committed to supporting the many pathways to grow produce consumption and are thrilled to partner with Jennifer’s team at Kids Eat in Color , who are doing incredible work helping families establish healthy habits around eating fresh fruits and vegetables.”

As part of its White House conference commitments, IFPA has also created educational materials on produce prescriptions for medical students, practitioners and patients; with the foundation, it has created a K-12 school breakfast resource that features fruit- and veggie-forward recipes to help school foodservice operators implement USDA’s proposed meal pattern updates, the release said.

Posters can be requested by pediatric health care providers from IFPA’s website. Those interested can also find more information about IFPA progress toward the Produce Industry White House Commitments.