The HBI pilot, which ended last year, scored its results with the use of a Military Nutrition Environment Assessment Tool, and on this rubric, DeCA scored a 91, meaning the commissaries that participated in the pilot fully supported a healthy eating environment.
While the offerings at DeCA commissaries are driven solely by consumer preference, the agency works in concert with several DOD programs – including the HBI, the Army’s Performance Triad, and Total Force Fitness, to name just a few – to help consumers make the best possible choices for themselves and their families. As a key resource to DOD’s health and wellness stakeholders, the commissaries continue their efforts to influence the nutrition, health, and eating habits of service members and their families, in part by increasing shoppers’ awareness of the availability of nutritious foods in DeCA stores.
As part of the HBI, several commissaries expanded patrons’ choices and access to fresh, local fruit and vegetables by hosting on-base farmers’ markets, a practice so popular that it continues today and has been expanded beyond the HBI pilot sites. Commissaries continue to carry a large and varied assortment of organic, natural, and gluten-free products, which have also grown in popularity to the extent that customers are requesting – and expecting – stores to segregate them from other products, in sections marked with bright green shelves and section dividers.
Children and adults showcase healthy treats at the Osan Air Base, South Korea, Commissary. DeCA is saving more than $40 million in transportation costs annually by requiring contractors to ship fresh fruits and vegetables directly to stores. DeCA photo
Last year, DeCA’s dietician, Deborah Harris, began producing the “Thinking Outside the Box” segment embedded on the commissary sales flyer found on the DeCA website. “Thinking Outside the Box” offers a cost-effective, time-saving, and healthy meal idea based on the items on promotion. A number of key DOD health and wellness stakeholders – including the Army Public Health Center, the Navy and Marine Corps Public Health Center, Operation Live Well, and the Air Force Medical Support Agency – are promoting “Thinking Outside the Box” on social media and at installations.
Benefits with Efficiency
While the value of the commissaries to service members and their families is clear and arguably increasing, that doesn’t always mean their worth is apparent to those looking at them from the outside. The surcharge attached to each commissary purchase, which is dedicated specifically to the building, maintenance, and renovation of facilities, was a measure explicitly designed to decrease the financial burden on taxpayers who aren’t eligible to shop at the commissaries.
The Pentagon’s 2016 budget request, for instance, proposed a $322 million reduction in support for the commissaries in 2016, to be followed by a $1 billion reduction the following year. The DOD eventually dropped that plan, conceding it was more focused on saving money than on the needs of service members, military retirees, and their families.
Particularly in peacetime, the commissaries are among the personnel benefits most often targeted for budget cuts, and this has been no less true since 2011. That year featured both the beginning of the military drawdown in Afghanistan and the culmination of a protracted budget fight between the executive and legislative branches: the Budget Control Act, which cut $487 billion from projected defense spending over the ensuing decade, and later, when sequestration was triggered by the law’s mechanisms, added another round of cuts that mandated a total cut of nearly $1 trillion.
A patron at the Ankara Air Base Commissary, Turkey, shops for fruits and vegetables at the DeCA Farmer’s Market in 2012. DeCA photo
The squeeze has inspired a round of speculation and proposals about how to proceed – proposals, for example, to consolidate the commissaries with the exchanges (the department store-style shopping centers on bases and at contingency sites); to privatize the commissaries; or simply to slash the commissaries’ budget. The Pentagon’s 2016 budget request, for instance, proposed a $322 million reduction in support for the commissaries in 2016, to be followed by a $1 billion reduction the following year. The DOD eventually dropped that plan, conceding it was more focused on saving money than on the needs of service members, military retirees, and their families.