While we’re waiting for the U.S.Department of Agriculture to release the final version of the updated nutrition standards for school meals and the proposed standards on competitive foods and beverages in schools, let’s have a quick look at the current status of school milk, especially flavored milk, and what might be coming in the future.

Current School Milk Requirements

The existing school nutrition standards for school meals, including breakfast and lunch, require milk to be served as a beverage with all meals. Schools must offer more than one fat level of milk, and lactose-free milk is allowed as an alternate for children with lactose intolerance. Non-dairy milk alternates must meet a variety of nutrient requirements, providing equivalent levels of nine nutrients to the levels found in milk. Flavored milk is allowed by federal guidelines, with no restrictions on sugar or fat content, but many school districts are limiting flavored milk because the higher levels of sugar and calories are perceived as  factors in childhood obesity. Currently, there are very few USDA restrictions on competitive foods or beverages (items sold outside the meal tray, including a la carte items in the cafeteria, vending machines or school stores). The only foods that are not allowed are “Foods of Minimal Nutritional Value” or FMNV. USDA regulations identify 10 categories of FMNV, including soda water, chewing gum, hard candy and water ices (not including water ices that contain fruit or fruit juice). No dairy products are included in the FMNV definition.

Possible Changes to School Milk

The proposed rule released by USDA in January 2011 placed new limits on milk served with school meals. Milk must be served as a beverage with all school breakfasts and lunches. However, milk would be limited to white low-fat and fat-free milk, and flavored milk would be required to be fat free. In IDFA’s comments to the proposed rule, we argued for the inclusion of low-fat flavored milk as well, but a number of other comments to the proposed rule agreed with USDA’s proposal. USDA staff is also working on rulemaking that would set nutritional standards for competitive foods. The proposal will probably be heavily based on an Institute of Medicine report released in April 2007. In that report, milk sold as a competitive beverage would be limited to white low-fat and fat-free milk and flavored milk with less than 22 grams of total sugars per one-cup serving. Since milk naturally contains 12 grams of lactose, this would allow for up to 10 grams of added sugars per cup of milk.

Dairy Industry Actions and Next Steps

Many dairy companies already have flavored milks with less sugar and fewer calories available for the school market. Many more are developing new formulations of flavored milk to meet school and parental interest in lower-calorie and less-sugar versions. When the final rule on nutrition standards for school meals is released, it will go into effect for the 2012-2013 school year. We anticipate that this final rule and the proposed rule on competitive foods in schools will be out in early 2012. We will let you know when these are released. Have you developed new milks for schools? What have you changed: fat, sugar, calories or all three?