The City of Fairfield is now a Blue Zone Community. It was recently announced that the city chosen as a demonstration site in 2012 for the Blue Zones Project had been certified. Mayor Ed Malloy says grocery stores, restaurants, schools, employers and residents participated to help the city achieve the status.

Iowa’s Blue Zones Project began as part of Governor Terry Branstad’s Healthiest State Initiative. Cities become a Blue Zone Community by meeting criteria and promoting lifestyle characteristics that are typical of five places in the world where people live to be 100 at rates 10 times higher than in the United States.

To learn more about Blue Zones and what Fairfield did to become one, listen to today’s In Touch with Southeast Iowa.