Government?s Healthy Schools Coordinator yesterday pledged to fight fat in schools.

Being an employee at the Department of Health since November 2004 Marie Beach has learned it takes a village to raise a child ? including not taking the easier, softer way when it came to student lunches.

?The Department of Health?s Nutrition Services has researched the contents of Lunchables and various beverages and found that Lunchables have high contents of fat and salt,? Marie Beach said at the Hamilton Rotary on Tuesday.

?These foods if they are eaten most or all of the time do not provide the energy that we need to function optimally.?

Ms Beach explained that juice drinks and carbonated sodas ? part of a category she called ?sometimes foods? ? provide ?empty calories? which do not provide the energy that people need to function properly.

Parents are also buying convenience foods, like bacon or deli containers, she said, at gas-stations and supermarkets as they dropped their children off at school.

Children who eat a lot of convenience foods with empty calories were either overactive or listless, sometimes falling asleep or daydreaming in class, she said.

?If they were to stop buying these unhealthy Lunchables and the bacon, the businesses would have to decrease their supplies. We should increase the demand for healthier food choices.?

Whether provided by parents, or at school, access to fat-filled foods was a problem, she said.

?Many parents are fighting principals, teachers and after-school staff about allowing their children to eat unhealthy foods and snacks,? she said. ?This is happening in public and private schools.

?I do not believe parents want to intentionally make their children unhealthy. Education is important, but parents must receive the message. No one wants to take parents? control away.?

Ms Beach said there was a need to improve children?s nutrition and increase physical activity because the workforce would eventually have to pay the rising healthcare cost treating chronic diseases. ?Unhealthy lifestyles generally lead to the development of chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and stroke,? she said.