Recent research indicates that low income adults and infants in the United States are more likely to be overweight than undernourished. Very possibly, the assumptions upon which food supplement programs are based are ill-founded. While many of the currently operating broadly conceived supplemental food programs achieve desirable collateral benefits, they may prove to be stop-gap measures that are less important than other steps that should be taken to ensure the health, well-being and future social competence of children and youth. To establish a sound basis for food policy, further research on nutrition is needed (or will continue) in several areas, including (1) the effects of adult obesity on health; (2) the contribution of infant obesity to adult obesity; (3) the role of diet in the genesis of degenerative vascular diseases; (4) the potential role of specific foods, food components and food additives in the etiology of various malignancies; (5) the need for trace minerals in the diet; (6) the identification of normal mechanisms of intestinal absorption and the role of gastrointestinal flora; (7) cell-mediated immunity; (8) the advantages and risks of breast feeding; and (9) the influence of nutrition on hyperactivity. Nutrition policy should make certain of the nutritional value and safety of convenience foods and intelligently inform the public about them. (Author/RH)