From our other sites
The story
Miki Fujimoto, appearing on Fuji TV’s information show “Mikity Dining,” visited the school lunch program at her husband Tomoharu Shoji’s alma mater and was stunned to learn that milk accounted for ¥73 of the ¥356 per-meal budget, suggesting “couldn’t we just use water instead?” The school nutritionist shot back immediately, “No, that’s not an option” — but her comment won praise on the 5ch forums. Thread posters debated what could replace milk as a calcium source, whether it’s right to force milk on kids with lactose intolerance, and what the move would mean for the dairy industry, splitting into camps over whether milk is an essential part of school lunch or just a fixed cost worth reconsidering.
Miki Fujimoto Stunned by Elementary School Lunch Budget: “Don’t You Just Think, Wouldn’t Water Be Fine?” — Talent Miki Fujimoto (41) and her husband Tomoharu Shoji (50), of the comedy duo Shinagawa Shoji, appeared together on Fuji TV’s “Mikity Dining” (Saturdays, 11 a.m.) on the 10th, sharing their thoughts on elementary school lunch budgets. The episode, a special “Revitalizing Towns Through Food in Kamata” edition, saw the pair visit an elementary school at the request of Shoji’s alma mater to learn about food education.
The two were asked to come up with a new school lunch menu idea. According to the nutritionist, the current lunch budget in Ota Ward for 5th and 6th graders is ¥356 per meal (recently raised by ¥10 thanks to extra ward funding), and that includes one carton of milk at ¥73 (tax included). Hearing the budget, both were taken aback, with Fujimoto remarking, “That’s rough.”
Then, reacting to the price of the milk, she said, “Wait, isn’t that expensive!? You’re telling me that out of the ¥360 you have to work with for the whole lunch, ¥70 goes just to milk? Don’t you start thinking, ‘wouldn’t water be fine?’” The nutritionist calmly replied, “No, that’s not really an option.”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
This has gotta be some US military conspiracy.
There's definitely something weird mixed into it too.
If anything, they'd been drinking it since the Asuka period.
Apparently Ieyasu ate rakugan sweets and cheese for his stomach.
Supposedly he was so into gut health he stuck a finger in his own anus every day.
Anchovies.
Yogurt or cheese work fine too, and tofu or fish are okay as well.
As long as you're drinking milk you've got most of your nutrition covered.
White rice and natto handle the rest.
Just don't go splurging on fish or meat.
Do that and it looks cheap, and you'll get slammed for it.
They just allowed kids to bring furikake (rice seasoning) from home to cut down on leftover plain rice, and people still lost it screaming 'WAAAAAH! What about nutritional balance?! What about food education?!' This is the kind of country where that'd never fly.
Growing kids don't need to be drinking low-fat milk.
Lol, that'd actually raise the cost.
Tofu would bring the cost down though.
It'd help protect farmers too, as a bonus.
And of course that gets collected from the parents, right?
Nutritionally it's also skewed — more fat than protein, and the mineral balance is off — so it's not really something you can call healthy.
Why are you making up baseless stuff like that?
Even for Japanese people, calcium absorption from milk is around 40%, which is higher than from fish or vegetables.
That's true for about half of Japanese people.
Far from just absorbing it poorly, some people get diarrhea or even develop allergies, so charging everyone for milk isn't a good idea.
Plus it provides the protein and fat that Japanese food tends to fall short on, which suits growing kids, and it's still one of the more cost-effective options.
My wife was the pickiest eater around and they'd make her sit there eating until 6th period if she didn't finish.
Unbelievable.
Turned out as an adult she had a mackerel allergy.
They force-fed her anyway, no questions asked — it's a wonder nobody died.
It was the Showa era — if someone had died, it probably just wouldn't have made the news, right?
Milk just isn't suited to Japanese people.
So true. I had diarrhea pretty much the whole time through elementary and middle school.
Even with lactose intolerance, 200ml of milk shouldn't upset your stomach.
That's just about the lactase enzyme — gut bacteria can break it down too.
If your logic held up, basically everyone in elementary and middle school would've been hit with diarrhea after every lunch.
Depends on the person.
Blindly trusting some vague standard and forcing it on everyone is straight-up outdated Showa-era thinking.
Then just use lactose-free milk, problem solved.
And yogurt's already broken down so it won't upset anyone's stomach either.
Forcing it on everyone is basically like the NHK license fee (Japan's mandatory TV broadcast fee).
Why have you been switching IDs this whole time?
Well, the school lunch nutrition standards require getting 50% of a day's calcium from the meal, so that'd fail the standard.
Then just skip the school lunch and bring a packed lunch from home?
If it's not covered through school lunch, people will just buy it at home instead, so total demand doesn't change.
In other words, no impact.
Background and Key Points of Debate
Milk in school lunches has long been a fixture as a cheap way to secure calcium, with guideline calcium intake levels set under Japan’s School Lunch Act implementation standards. As pointed out in the thread, milk’s calcium absorption rate is said to be higher than that of other foods, but it’s also well known that a certain portion of Japanese people are lactose intolerant. Fujimoto’s remark was a simple observation focused on cost, but actually cutting milk would leave open questions on both the nutritional and industry side — namely, what would replace it as a calcium source and what the impact on the dairy industry would be. The divide in opinions on the thread essentially comes down to whether people see milk as “essential” or as a “fixed cost that can be reconsidered.”
※This article is compiled as an excerpt and summary of the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “Miki Fujimoto: ‘Of the ¥360 budget for school lunch, ¥70 goes to milk. Why not switch that to water first?’ → Praised“.
Leave a Reply