Planning Diets for the Food Stamp Program

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is responsible for managing and administering the national food stamp program. This program provides vouchers to low income families that can be used in place of cash to produce food at grocery stores. In determining the cash value of the vouchers issued, the USDA must consider how much it costs to obtain a nutritional, well-balanced diet for men and women in various age groups. As a first step in the is process, the USDA identified and analyzed 31 different food groups and determined the contributions a serving from each group makes to 24 different nutritional categories. A partial listing of this information is given in Figure 7.20.

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