"We have to stay healthy and not eat junk food," said Sydni Simmons, a fourth grader at Stockton Elementary School. "Sometimes we have ice cream after dinner at home, but mostly my mom makes us eat healthy."
The Wednesday event is a sign that the "localvore" movement, in which consumers buy locally grown produce for the dual benefits of fresher food and reducing the carbon footprint of eating, is moving beyond restaurants and foodie circles into school cafeterias.
In Cherry Hill, school caterers say they try to buy local produce wherever they can through fruit and vegetable wholesalers like the one Hayden works for, putting New Jersey peaches and apples on the lunch line alongside government-issue powdered mashed potatoes and cheeseburgers.
"This has sort of filtered down from the college level, after students there started asking for salad bars and then, more recently, for locally sourced produce," said Bill Walker Jr., a marketing official with the New Jersey Department of Agriculture. "These sorts of programs are becoming increasingly common."
Not coincidentally, the push to bring locally farmed produce into the schools comes as health officials work to get children to eat healthier and to reduce obesity rates. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the obesity rate among U.S. children 6 to 11 increased from 6.5 percent in the late 1970s to 17 percent in the mid 2000s - with similar increases seen among younger children and teenagers.
But the fast foods and sugary beverages blamed for that widening of the national waistline are becoming increasingly rare in schools, as education officials across the country have rewritten the rules on vending machines and the nutritional content of school meals.
