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USDA is finalizing its November 25, 2020, proposed rulemaking regarding child nutrition meal pattern requirements. This final rule with request for comments was published on February 7, 2022. It will establish transitional standards to support the continued provision of nutritious school meals as schools respond to and recover from the pandemic and while USDA engages in notice-and-comment rulemaking to update the meal pattern standards to more comprehensively reflect the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025. This final rule will provide immediate relief to schools during the return to traditional school meal service following extended use of COVID-19 meal pattern flexibilities. This rule finalizes the proposed milk provision by allowing local operators of the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program to offer flavored, low-fat milk (1 percent fat) for students in grades K through 12 and for sale as a competitive beverage. It will also allow flavored, low-fat milk in the Special Milk Program for Children and in the Child and Adult Care Food Program for participants ages 6 and older. Beginning in SY 2022-2023, this final rule will require at least 80 percent of the weekly grains in the school lunch and breakfast menus to be whole grain-rich. Lastly, this final rule will modify the proposed sodium standards and establish Sodium Target 1 as the sodium limit for school lunch and breakfast in SY 2022-2023 as proposed, but implement a Sodium Interim Target 1A effective for school lunch beginning in SY 2023-2024.

USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service invited interested persons to submit written comments on the provisions of this final rule. Interested persons were also invited to comment on considerations for future rulemaking related to the school nutrition requirements. The public will have an additional opportunity to comment when the Food and Nutrition Service publishes a new proposed rule related to the school meal pattern requirements.