DoD should have consistent nutrition labeling and improve service members’ access to healthy foods at installations, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office.

“DOD has taken steps to implement a key nutrition labeling program at its appropriated fund dining facilities, along with a range of key nutrition initiatives,” according to the report. “However, selected installations have not fully implemented the labeling program.”

To come to its findings, GAO conducted interviews with DoD and military service officials, conducted five discussion groups and reviewed operations across 19 dining facilities between July 2022 and June 2024.

Some service members reported having to walk 1.5 miles from their work site to a dining facility or not having enough time to eat because the closest dining facility was too far away, GAO found.

Of the 11 recommendations that GAO made in March 2022, DoD has implemented two and taken steps to implement the remaining nine as of January 2024, according to the report.

“At 14 of the 19 dining facilities in our sample, we observed examples of color and sodium codes that were missing, inaccurate, not standardized, or improperly placed,” the report found. “At 16 of the 19 dining facilities in our sample, food service program officials told us that food service staff had not been trained on [their color-coded nutrition labeling program], as required.”

The Army operates 146 dining facilities, which it calls warrior restaurants, throughout the continental U.S. and 54 dining facilities outside of the continental U.S., according to an official cited in the report. It utilizes a color-coded nutrition labeling program called Go for Green, which divides food into green (eat often), yellow (eat occasionally) and red (eat rarely) categories.

Though the Army meets most of the elements of its color-coded nutrition labeling program, its food service policies did not address food placement strategies or the promotion of “green-coded items,” GAO found.

The Army has taken several steps to increase food options for soldiers, including updating the Army Food Service Program buyer’s guide to incorporate new nutrition requirements and increasing the number of “nutritious recipes available to all military services and dining facilities across the department … from approximately 1600 recipes to 2400 recipes between 2017 and 2021,” Army officials told GAO.

The report recommends that the secretary of the Army outline the steps that dining facilities can take to implement the required program elements and oversee the Army food service program through the Go for Green program fidelity assessment tool.

Poor health and nutrition are “growing challenges that threaten the department’s ability to recruit and retain a fit and healthy force,” the report concludes.

“Establishing guidance for military service dining facilities to implement each of the required program elements … could help ensure that served food meets minimum nutrition standards and is coded, labeled, and presented … so that service members can make informed decisions about their diets,” the report found.

Read the full report here.