Military dining facilities aren’t following guidelines that aim to offer nutritious meals for service members, and the Pentagon has not done necessary annual reviews of those food programs in roughly a decade, a government watchdog has found.
A report from the Government Accountability Office, published Monday, found an initiative established in 2008 called “Go for Green” that labels foods offered at military dining facilities by color codes — green for healthy foods that should be eaten often; yellow for foods that should be eaten only occasionally and in moderation; and red for unhealthy foods that should be consumed rarely — has not been fully implemented at many facilities.
The government watchdog “observed examples of color and sodium codes that were missing, not standardized, or improperly placed” and added the Pentagon has “not fully addressed congressionally directed efforts to increase access to nutritious food.”
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GAO investigators examined 19 dining facilities at eight military installations representing all Defense Department service branches across the country, from Joint Base Charleston on the East Coast to Naval Base San Diego on the West Coast. At many of those facilities — 16 out of 19 — food service officials said that “staff had not been trained” in the Go for Green nutrition program as required, the…
