Healthy Youth Partnership invites you to be a partner in the creation, development and implementation of a Food Policy Council to address the food system in the metro St. Louis region.
The goal is to ensure healthy, affordable, accesible, culturally sensitive, local food for all people in the St. Louis region.
A non-profit organization in St. Louis, MO, HYP is a dynamic and continually growing coalition of organizations and institutions from diverse sectors confronting the crisis of youth obesity in the St. Louis Region. The mission of the partnership is to work to eliminate youth obesity through collaborations that promote healthy eating and active living in the St. Louis Region.
In March of 2009, HYP began the creation, development and implementation of a Food Policy Council to address the food system in the Metro St. Louis Region. The group grew out of Congressman Russ Carnahan’s Healthy Foods Initiative. Food Policy Councils bring together stakeholders from diverse food-related sectors to examine how the food system is operating and to develop recommendations on how to improve it. Individuals involved with the development of the St. Louis Food Policy Council include food producers and distributors, researchers, farmers, concerned citizens, health experts, neighborhood groups, school administrators, representatives from local and state government, urban gardeners, representatives from food banks, community organizers and retail managers. The University of Missouri Extension office has been instrumental in facilitating this process.
The group is open to all people interested in the food system in St. Louis.
The Regional Food Summit was held on March 4th, 2010, a regional discussion about the development of a Food Policy Council Steering Committee for the St. Louis Region. The Summit brought together residents of the metro region to discuss the benefits of food system planning. It included breakout sessions on food access, healthy retail, farm to school programs, and production and distribution. The summit featured Mark Winne, author of Closing the Food Gap, as the keynote speaker. The summit was held at Saint Louis University in the Allied Health Building from 8am-4pm.
A VIP reception was held the night before the summit, March 3rd, from 5:30-7:30 pm, at the Piper Palm House in Tower Grove Park. Mark Winne read from his book and it included samples of local food.
