Published: January 2023

Publisher: Healthy Eating Research

Authors: Zhang Q, Patel P, Neupane B, Lowery CM

See more related research

Share


On November 17, 2022, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced major food package revisions to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). Among other changes, the proposed rule suggests removing juice from the food package, reducing the maximum allowance for milk, and requiring whole grain criteria in breakfast cereal. Therefore, this brief focuses on three food groups in the WIC food package: juice, milk, and breakfast cereal. A narrative review of the peer-reviewed literature, published between January 1, 2009, and October 31, 2022, was conducted to examine the evidence to answer three specific questions: 1) How did WIC participants’ juice consumption behaviors and health outcomes change after the 2009 food package revision, which reduced the 100% juice allowance?; 2) What are current milk consumption behaviors among WIC participants and their association with health outcomes?; and 3) How do preferences for breakfast cereals vary by race and ethnicity, particularly among the Hispanic population, which accounted for over 35% of the participants in 2019 (USDA, 2021)? These questions were developed by researchers during a workshop hosted by the Healthy Eating Research (HER) and Nutrition & Obesity Policy Research & Evaluation Network (NOPREN) WIC Learning Collaborative in response to the proposed WIC food revisions.

Related Research

September 2025

Food Insecurity-Related Stigma Among Adults in the United States: A Scoping Review

This review aimed to characterize individual- and structural-level stigma associated with government (ie, SNAP, WIC) and emergency food program (ie, food banks, pantries, cupboards, soup kitchens) utilization in the US. 5 databases (PubMed, PsychINFO, Web of Science, CINAHL, Sociological Abstracts) were searched in June 2024. The review included peer-reviewed articles (January 2004 – June 2024), More

August 2025

Lived Experiences of Families Navigating Safety Net Expansions and Retractions During the Pandemic: A Qualitative Study

This study aimed to understand the experiences of families with low income in California with pandemic safety net support expansions and retractions, including barriers to program access. Using open-ended questions, we explored the self-reported experiences of pandemic-era safety net expansions and expirations between January and June 2023 among a group of caregivers of young children More

August 2025

Diet Quality and Weight Status are Predicted by Federal Nutrition Assistance Program Participation, Health, and Demographics

This study investigated whether demographic, social, and economic determinants of health, including length of time participating in safety net programs, are associated with diet quality and weight status in early childhood. Using the WIC infant and toddler feeding practices study-2, classification and regression tree identified the sequence of binary splits that best differentiated the sample More