The New Jersey Food Stamp Nutrition Education Program is a collaboration of public and private business, non-profit organizations, voluntary health agencies (e.g. the American Cancer Society), trade organizations, faith-based organizations, and government agencies whose mission is to provide nutrition education to increase the food security of New Jersey’s limited resource population.

Nutrition education is defined as education designed to improve:

• Food Security
• Food Safety
• Dietary Quality
• Food Resource Management/Shopping Behaviors

Food security is defined as:
Access by all people at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life. Food security includes at a minimum:

• The ready availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods
• Assured ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways (without resorting to emergency food supplies, scavenging, stealing, or other coping strategies)

The limited resource population is defined as:

• For adults-Both food stamp program participants and members of the population who are food stamp eligible.
• For youth- all programming is conducted in locations where at least 50% of the youth receive free or reduced lunches.

We accomplish our mission by:

• Providing behaviorally focused, outcome- based nutrition education classes in small group adult settings, and with youth.

Small groups are defined as:

• Classes consisting of 4-15 adults of which 50% or more are food stamp program participants. Participants must attend a minimum of 6 sessions.