Pizza as a Vegetable (FY2012 Agriculture Appropriations)

Congressional Research Service Summary

The FY2012 Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act included a provision in its agriculture section that blocked proposed USDA nutritional reforms for school lunches. The USDA had proposed requiring half a cup of tomato paste to count as a vegetable serving (up from two tablespoons). Congress overrode this, keeping the existing standard in place.

Bill Details

In 2011, the USDA proposed new rules to improve school lunch nutrition, including limiting potatoes, increasing whole grains, and requiring more tomato paste to count as a vegetable. The frozen food industry — particularly companies producing school-lunch pizzas — lobbied heavily against the changes. Congress responded by inserting language into the appropriations bill that preserved the existing standard.

The result: a slice of pizza with two tablespoons of tomato sauce continued to count as a vegetable serving under federal school lunch guidelines. While technically Congress never declared “pizza is a vegetable,” the practical effect of blocking the USDA’s reforms was exactly that. The episode became a symbol of food-industry lobbying power and was widely ridiculed in the press.

Source: This is a real bill introduced in the 112th Congress. View on Congress.gov.

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