MEXICO CITY (AP) — Schools in Mexico will have six months to implement a government-sponsored ban on junk food or else face heavy fines, officials said Monday. The rules, published on Sept. 30, target products that have become staples for two or three generations of Mexican schoolkids: sugary fruit drinks sold in triangular cardboard cartons, chips, artificial pork rinds and soy-encased, salty peanuts with chile.
School administrators who violate the order will face fines equivalent to between $545 and $5,450, which could double for a second offense, amounting to nearly a year’s wages for some of them. Mexico's children have the highest consumption of junk food in Latin America and many get 40% of their total caloric intake from it, according to the U.N.
Children’s Fund which labeled child obesity there an emergency. The new ban targets products that have become staples for two or three generations of Mexican schoolkids: sugary fruit drinks sold in triangular cardboard cartons, chips, artificial pork rinds and soy-encased, salty peanuts with chile. Previous attempts to implement laws against so-called ‘junk food’ have met with little success.
President Claudia Sheinbaum said Monday schools would have to offer water fountains and alternative snacks, like bean tacos. “It is much better to eat a bean taco than a bag of potato chips,” Sheinbaum said. “It is much better to drink hibiscus flower water than soda.
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