The Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) helps women, infants, and children get a strong start in life. This program is a lifeline for over 115,000 Kentucky parents, caregivers, and kids, providing them with food benefits through an EBT card, nutrition education, breastfeeding support, and more.

One of WIC’s primary goals is to ensure that moms and kids get the nutritious foods they need to grow and thrive. To help meet this goal, USDA recently updated the WIC food package. This update increases the value of WIC benefits, provides more flexibility for families to purchase nutritious and culturally appropriate foods, and cuts back on added sugar.

Here’s What’s New:

  • Canned Fish and Beans: This update allows families to purchase more protein-rich, shelf-stable foods with WIC, such as canned beans and canned fish.
  • Fruits and Vegetables: WIC’s Fruit and Vegetable benefit is getting a big increase in the updated food package! Children ages 1-4 will now receive $24 per month, pregnant and postpartum women will now receive $43 per month, and breastfeeding women will now receive $47 per month.
  • Infant Foods: This update helps moms reach their breastfeeding goals by providing more flexibility on how much infant formula partially breastfeeding families can get every month.
  • Juice Consumption: With the fruit and vegetable benefit increasing, WIC will now limit juice allowances to 64 ounces to encourage fruit consumption and limit added sugars.
  • Milk and Dairy: This update provides families with more options for what kind and how much milk they purchase. Families will have more flexibility on package size and more options to purchase non-dairy milk alternatives, such as soy and almond milk.
  • Whole Grains and Breakfast Cereals: Families can now use WIC to purchase whole grains such as quinoa, blue cornmeal, and naan. This change reflects new dietary guidelines and provides flexibility for participants to purchase more culturally appropriate foods. 

The Impact

By broadening food choices, aligning with current dietary guidelines, and accommodating cultural foods, the USDA aims to ensure that pregnant women, new mothers, infants, and young children have equitable access to the nutrition they critically need during these foundational stages of life.

Get the word out about WIC!

Through the WIC CIAO project, Kentucky Youth Advocates and partners across the state have been working to improve WIC access and awareness for Kentuckians, especially kinship caregivers and Latinx Kentuckians. 

To help get the word out, we have created a WIC outreach toolkit for local communities, leaders, and professionals who serve young children to use to promote WIC. This toolkit includes flyers and social media posts that local communities, organizations, and professionals who serve young children can use to promote WIC access among families.