Food Relief Research Articles

Predictors of Food Insecurity and Food Assistance Program Usage Among Puerto Ricans Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Holyoke, Massachusetts

Background/Objectives: Puerto Rican households often face elevated rates of food insecurity. Frequently, households experiencing food insecurity turn to federal and emergency nutrition assistance for urgent or prolonged aid. This study analyzes factors influencing food insecurity and food assistance program involvement among Puerto Ricans in Holyoke, Massachusetts, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: Using a combination of community-based participatory recruitment, purposive sampling, and web-based tools, we collected 284 survey responses. Our paper employed Pearson’s chi-square, logistic regression, and hierarchical linear models to assess relationships between demographic and household attributes and food access outcomes. Results: Variables such as having children in the household and age significantly influenced food relief participation and food insecurity outcomes. Puerto Rican heritage and low educational attainment were strong predictors of obtaining federal food aid. Low-income participants disproportionately faced food shortages and depended on emergency food initiatives. Our findings indicate that demographic and household factors significantly influence food insecurity and accessibility. Conclusions: Our study demonstrates that the pandemic made it challenging for households to obtain consistent, safe, and affordable nourishment. The impacts were unequally spread; hence, Puerto Rican communities and low-income groups were most affected.

Unpacking “the surprise chain”: the governance of food security during the COVID-19 pandemic in Melbourne, Australia

AbstractFood systems are being affected by multiple shocks related to climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and geopolitical events. Food prices and food insecurity are rising globally as a result, raising questions about the effective governance of food security during shocks. This paper critically examines the governance of food security in Melbourne, Australia during a major food system shock, the COVID-19 pandemic. It draws on document analysis and 34 stakeholder interviews with 41 participants from government, industry and civil society between May 2020 and March 2021. The paper examines the role of these actors in governance mechanisms for two important aspects of food system governance during the COVID-19 pandemic, continuity of food supply and delivery of emergency food relief. Clark et al.’s (2021) “governance engagement continuum” is used to show how civil society groups were excluded from these formal governance mechanisms, instead establishing their own spaces of “self-governance”. The resilience aims associated with these governance mechanisms are also analyzed using Zurek et al.’s (2022) “three R’s” (robustness, recovery and reorientation) framework. Our study highlights the significant role of food industry actors in the continuity of food supply and delivery of emergency food relief, and it shows the vulnerabilities of emergency food relief that depends on industry food “surpluses” as a model for addressing food insecurity during food system shocks. We conclude that greater government leadership is needed in the governance of food security during food system shocks, and in implementation of legislative and policy approaches that are grounded in the human right to food.

Food Banks as a "Treasure Trove": Users' Experiences of a Western Australian Food Relief Organization.

Food banks are providing crucial relief as food insecurity increases worldwide. While these services are essential for vulnerable populations, there is variability in foods available and users may experience poor nutritional quality, and an overabundance of discretionary foods, contributing to public health risks including overnutrition and obesity. Understanding how customers perceive food availability, variety, and quality is important to inform relief services and health interventions. This study reports the findings of a convergent parallel mixed-methods investigation of user experiences and perceptions of food availability, variety, and quality at a major food bank in Western Australia. Food bank customers (N = 207) at a food bank branch and mobile van locations completed a survey, with an option to complete a subsequent semi-structured interview (n = 15). Approximately 80% of the survey sample had low (48%) or very low (30%) food security, half of the sample had been using the food bank for longer than 6 months, and 77% reported the food bank as their first choice for food. Three-quarters (77%) reported financial barriers to a balanced diet in the past twelve months and described how limited availability and variety complicated shopping. Interviewees explained complex perceptions of these issues, including favouring healthy food while considering discretionary food as a "luxury" that enhanced their quality of life. Our findings suggest that food bank users experience barriers to maintaining a balanced diet, encounter variable supplies of healthy and nutritious foods, and have concerns about the impacts of frequent discretionary food consumption. These findings have implications for public health promotion.

Rural Micro-Entrepreneurs' Experiences Coping with the Pandemic in Nigeria

The COVID-19 epidemic has had a substantial impact on Nigeria's micro, small, and medium-sized companies (MSMEs), disrupting economic activities. The combination of limited travel, the necessity to maintain physical distance, and varying degrees of community lockdown and quarantine has resulted in economic stagnation for these firms. This qualitative study looked at how rural entrepreneurs deal with the epidemic while going about their everyday business. Data demonstrate that rural entrepreneurs are anxious about their health and financial situation. Spirituality and inventive marketing methods were used to ameliorate the pandemic's negative consequences. Rural entrepreneurs resorted to survival attempts despite the government's cash aid and food relief packages. This paper improves government interventions by suggesting new remedies and laws. It also seeks to increase access to government relief programmes for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), particularly those that are informal and unregistered. The report also recommends the implementation of information technology (IT) solutions.

Effects of Interventions on Household Food Security in Ilchamus Ward, Marigat Sub-county, Kenya

Widespread hunger and malnutrition persist today despite considerable growth in per capita food availability. This has prompted an evolving conceptualization of food security and of mechanisms to attain and maintain food security. Government and Non-governmental organizations are shifting from food relief provisions to diversification intervention strategies at the household level. However, there has been limited literature, especially from a sociological perspective, on the effects of effects of interventions on household food security. The study adopted the descriptive research design, where household experiences were documented using a structured questionnaire. A proportionate stratified sampling method was used to divide the sample of 170 households into 4 locations. The obtained data was analyzed using SPSS v25.0, and the findings were reported using descriptive statistics, including frequencies and percentages presented in tables and charts. The results show that interventions are on nutrition, health, sanitation, education and local knowledge as ways of improving household food security. The study recommends that apart from providing food relief responses, the government, together with food provision stakeholders, should lay out sustainable food policies, implement them, and conduct capacity building with the farmers by arranging and conducting training seminars and sessions to equip the community with appropriate household food security information.

Benchmarking the university campus food environment and exploring student perspectives about food insecurity and healthy eating: a case study from Australia

ObjectiveTo benchmark the university food environment and explore students’ experiences with food insecurity and healthy eating in order to inform interventions to improve access and affordability of healthy foods for university students.DesignA food environment audit was conducted on the university campus using the Uni-Food tool from April to May 2022 and was comprised of three main components, university systems and governance, campus facilities and environment, and food retail outlets. A qualitative study design was also used to conduct focus groups and semi-structured interviews with students to explore key themes regarding their experiences with food insecurity and healthy eating.SettingMacquarie University, Australia.ParticipantsFor the food environment audit 24 retail outlets on campus and for the qualitative component 29 domestic and international students enrolled at Macquarie University.ResultsThe university only scored 27% in total for all components in the food environment audit. The results showed the need for better governance and leadership of the food environment. The qualitative component suggested that the main barriers to accessing healthy foods were related to availability, pricing, and knowledge of healthy foods. Future intervention ideas included free fruits and vegetables, food relief, discounts, improved self-catering facilities, education, and increased healthy food outlets.ConclusionsImproving governance measures related to healthy eating on campus are a core priority to strengthen the food environment and students identified pricing and availability as key issues. These findings will inform effective and feasible interventions to improve food security and healthy eating on campus.

Comparison of Inclusion of Skimmed Milk and Edible Insects on the Nutritional, Sensory and Microbial Qualities of Enriched High Energy Rice Biscuits

Aims: The growing world population, carbon foot prints of rearing conventional protein sources, issues of protein malnutrition (particularly in developing nations) and the urgent needs of protein-rich food relief materials in crisis situations may necessitate the utilisation of underutilised sustainable, nutritious protein sources. The study was conducted to investigate the possibility of using indigenous food crops and substituting milk powder with edible insects’ powder as a sustainable alternative protein source in high energy rice biscuits.
 Study Design: Biscuits were produced following the standard USAID recipe for HEB and comparisons were made with the insect biscuits and STD.
 Place and Duration of Study: Department of Food Science and Technology, Federal University of Technology, Akure, Ondo State, Nigeria, between January 2018 and August 2018.
 Methodology: The high energy biscuits was evaluated for proximate composition, total sugars using Anthrone reagent, micronutrients (vitamins and minerals), physical properties such as spread ratio, weight, width etc. Microbial and sensory quality of the biscuits were also determined using standard methods.
 Results: From the findings of the study, rice biscuits with silkworm pupae had outstanding protein (12.76 g/100 g), fat (15.78 g/100 g) and energy (451.38 Kcal/100 g) contents while biscuit with migratory locust powder had slightly higher total ash and CHO. The spread ratios of the biscuits were within acceptable range. In terms of mineral composition, all the insect biscuits were significantly superior to the milk biscuit except for calcium. However, all the rice HEB exceeded the minimum USAID specifications for nutritive elements. The insect biscuits had more than quadruple the recommended pro-vitamin A content (1200. 67 and 2390.05 μg/100 g) and impressive amounts of vitamin C (94.19 and 52.39 mg/100 g). The microbial assessment revealed HEB with remarkable quality signifying wholesome raw materials and hygienic sample preparation. All samples received good sensorial ranking, but HEB with migratory locust was preferred.
 Conclusion: The results demonstrated that edible insects could serve as alternative protein source in the production of a nutritious high energy biscuit with good organoleptic and microbiological qualities.

Concevoir un centre alimentaire communautaire pour favoriser la sécurité alimentaire

Objective: The objective of this community-based participatory action research (CBPAR) project was to gain an in-depth understanding of the needs, interest and opportunities that exist within a post-secondary institution with respect to supporting food security among students via a food hub. Methods: The project was undertaken on the campus of the University of British Columbia-Vancouver. The CBPAR approach included 4 phases: 1) information gathering, 2) relationship development, 3) implementation of the community engagement strategy, and 4) shareback of findings to the community. Results: Phase 1 identified key components that formed the research process including campus partners for relationship development (phase 2) and subsequent engagement through their networks (phase 3). Phase 3 included engagement of 62, 111, 156, and 154 students, who participated in facilitated dialogues, community meals, a survey and targeted survey, respectively. Food insecurity related experiences were prevalent, with 37% to 75% indicating they worried about running out of food in the last year. Over 90% of all survey respondents affirmed that they would access a community food hub (CFH). Preferences for the CFH were inclusion of emergency food access, community meals, and financial support and planning, while prioritizing foods that meet cultural needs, and a low cost grocery store within the CFH. Conclusion: There is a demonstrated need and desire among students for innovative approaches to support food security at a post-secondary institution. The process outlined may serve as a road map for other communities who are seeking to move beyond emergency food relief.

Using Natural Language Processing to Explore Social Media Opinions on Food Security: Sentiment Analysis and Topic Modeling Study.

Social media has the potential to be of great value in understanding patterns in public health using large-scale analysis approaches (eg, data science and natural language processing [NLP]), 2 of which have been used in public health: sentiment analysis and topic modeling; however, their use in the area of food security and public health nutrition is limited. This study aims to explore the potential use of NLP tools to gather insights from real-world social media data on the public health issue of food security. A search strategy for obtaining tweets was developed using food security terms. Tweets were collected using the Twitter application programming interface from January 1, 2019, to December 31, 2021, filtered for Australia-based users only. Sentiment analysis of the tweets was performed using the Valence Aware Dictionary and Sentiment Reasoner. Topic modeling exploring the content of tweets was conducted using latent Dirichlet allocation with BigML (BigML, Inc). Sentiment, topic, and engagement (the sum of likes, retweets, quotations, and replies) were compared across years. In total, 38,070 tweets were collected from 14,880 Twitter users. Overall, the sentiment when discussing food security was positive, although this varied across the 3 years. Positive sentiment remained higher during the COVID-19 lockdown periods in Australia. The topic model contained 10 topics (in order from highest to lowest probability in the data set): "Global production," "Food insecurity and health," "Use of food banks," "Giving to food banks," "Family poverty," "Food relief provision," "Global food insecurity," "Climate change," "Australian food insecurity," and "Human rights." The topic "Giving to food banks," which focused on support and donation, had the highest proportion of positive sentiment, and "Global food insecurity," which covered food insecurity prevalence worldwide, had the highest proportion of negative sentiment. When compared with news, there were some events, such as COVID-19 support payment introduction and bushfires across Australia, that were associated with high periods of positive or negative sentiment. Topics related to food insecurity prevalence, poverty, and food relief in Australia were not consistently more prominent during the COVID-19 pandemic than before the pandemic. Negative tweets received substantially higher engagement across 2019 and 2020. There was no clear relationship between topics that were more likely to be positive or negative and have higher or lower engagement, indicating that the identified topics are discrete issues. In this study, we demonstrated the potential use of sentiment analysis and topic modeling to explore evolution in conversations on food security using social media data. Future use of NLP in food security requires the context of and interpretation by public health experts and the use of broader data sets, with the potential to track dimensions or events related to food security to inform evidence-based decision-making in this area.

Poverty, Provisioning and the Pandemic: Income and Food Insecurity Among Waste Picker Households During the 2020 Lockdown in Delhi

The containment measures during the COVID-19 pandemic have had severe economic consequences on the lives of the urban informal poor in India. Several scholars have commented on the vital yet insufficient role that government-run food relief programmes, mutual aid practices and private charity have played in addressing hunger during lockdown periods. This article investigates the impact of lockdown measures on food security among waste pickers in nine Delhi neighbourhoods through an analysis of data collected from daily telephone surveys with 70 adult and 69 child waste pickers over a 54-day period. Analysis of this data reveals that while respondents relied heavily on emergency food relief programmes, their sense of hunger was closely connected to their ability to provide food for themselves. Drawing on these insights, the article concludes by offering policy and programmatic recommendations to address food security problems for the urban poor in general.

Assessing Physical, Mental, and Social Factors Associated with Refugee Children Food Insecurity, Food Relief Barriers, and Lessons Learned in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region: A Scoping Review

ABSTRACT The purpose of this scoping review was to assess the physical, social, and mental health factors associated with food insecurity among refugee children in the MENA region. The Arksey and O’Malley (2005) York methodology guided the review. Included studies emphasized physical, social, and mental health factors associated with food insecurity among MENA refugee children. Twelve limitation categories were identified based on recurrence across studies. Major themes were highlighted from lessons learned across studies. Results may contribute to an understanding of limitations to consider when developing food relief interventions among children’s refugees in the MENA region.

Food relief providers as care infrastructures: Sydney during the pandemic

AbstractAustralia has a hidden but growing problem with household food insecurity, revealing the failure of conventional food infrastructures to support human flourishing. Disruptions to employment and livelihoods due to pandemic lockdowns have exacerbated household food insecurity, evincing the uneven geography of food access in countries globally, including Australia. Increasing demand for food relief had been observed prior to the COVID‐19 pandemic and has been met by food relief providers, which we consider as infrastructures of care addressing growing levels of hunger. This paper reveals COVID‐19’s many impacts on the food relief sector across Metropolitan Sydney, New South Wales. It analyses both a questionnaire of food relief providers in 2022 and media articles, social media posts, reports, and websites. It provides much‐needed insights into the impacts of pandemic lockdowns on the demand for food, interruptions to food provisioning, changes to food supply, and alterations made to suppliers’ ways of operating. Those insights show how infrastructures of care are place‐based, responsive, dynamic, and constrained by caring capacities. Such insights are increasingly important for understanding infrastructural failures, documenting the real extent of household food insecurity, and challenging dominant discourses of Australia as a food‐secure nation.

Effect of COVID-19 on Food Pricing and Coping Strategies Among Households in Kakamega County Kenya

Food price shocks exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic have the potential to threaten food security, especially among low-income households. The aim of this study was to assess the effect of COVID-19 on food prices and the coping strategies of households in Malava and Lurambi Sub-Counties of Kakamega County, Kenya. The researchers adopted a descriptive survey design for this study. A semi-structured questionnaire was developed using KoBo Collect and synchronized to the Open Data Kit (ODK) server and used to collect data from a sample size of 200 households. Data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences Version 26 to generate descriptive statistics. Results reveal that food prices significantly affected households as they depended on the market for food supply, with nutritious food items such as meat, vegetables, milk, and fruits exposed to significant food price shocks arising from COVID-19. Coping strategies included a reduced number of meals per day, reduced dietary diversity, and lower expenditure on health and education, calling for State and County Government interventions to provide food relief and transfer payments for vulnerable households.

Australia’s Presidents? Herbert Hoover and Lyndon B. Johnson Remembered

Among US presidents, Herbert Hoover and Lyndon Johnson had the strongest ties to Australia. Hoover spent over a year in Australia as a mining engineer before launching a career in international business, food relief, and politics. In 1942, LBJ passed part of his pre-presidential career in Australia. Yet Johnson’s presidential tour in 1966, coupled with his return in 1967, generated massive enthusiasm and modest protests against the Vietnam War. President Johnson’s visits helped to solidify and celebrate US-Australian ties while encouraging Australian independence, even if during a war directed from Washington. While Hoover left his mark on Australia’s landscape in the mines he promoted and the sites that still stand, Australians found little appealing in the dour, Depression-era president who had come and gone without regarding their country as a friend or ally. Johnson thus became a consequential figure in Australia’s national history in ways Hoover never did.

‘We’ve Never Done This Before’

How do you build a community around a systemic problem such as food justice in a crisis via creative resilience methodologies? In what ways can the lessons learned in a creative crisis response help foster a more adaptive and responsive food system in preparing for future crises? ‘We’ve never done this before’ became the motto of Fawkner Commons when local residents, Jen Rae from Fair Share Fare and partner Sally Beattie co-founder of Fawkner Food Bowls mobilised local food producers, community members and partners to covert a community garden into an urban farm and a disused lawn bowling club into a community-led COVID-19-response food hub. Fawkner, the most food insecure and culturally diverse suburb in the City of Merri-bek1 (5kms north of the CBD of Melbourne, Australia) was heavily impacted by the 2020–21 COVID-19 Victorian state lockdowns, restrictions, case numbers and deaths. While most food relief organisations closed or were overwhelmed, Fawkner Commons became a central hub for food aggregation and provisioning, distributing over $116K boxes of no-cost/low-cost culturally relevant food boxes and over 2,400 prepared meals in 2020. This article is a critical reflection delving into some of the creative methodologies underpinning the success of Fawkner Commons and its legacy in the community. With a focus on social cohesion, accessibility and inclusion, it offers lessons to support the transformation of other hyperlocal food systems to become more adaptive, responsive and collaborative working with communities, artists, local government and food organisations.

Molecular networking-guided isolation strategy of a new C-glycosyl flavone rotamer from Stellaria alsine and evaluation of anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities.

Stellaria alsine has traditionally been used as both a famine relief food and an alternative medicine in East Asia. Modern pharmacological studies have revealed that S. alsine has various biological effects such as anticancer, anti-hepatoma, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidative effects. However, the anti-inflammatory properties of chemical constituents derived from this plant have not been studied well. To identify potential therapeutic candidate for treating inflammatory diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The distribution of chemical compounds was investigated by Global Natural Product Social (GNPS)-based molecular networking (MN) analysis using UPLC-Orbitrap tandem mass spectrometry. The anti-inflammatory and antioxidative effects of S. alsine extracts and fractions were evaluated by measuring interleukin (IL)-8 and reactive oxygen species (ROS) productions. The active EA layer of S. alsine showed the highest percentage of major compounds by feature-based molecular networking. The top candidate structures of EA fraction were rapidly annotated as flavone C- or O-glycosides via an advanced analysis tool, Network Annotation Propagation (NAP). With the GNPS molecular networking-guided isolation strategy, a new C-glycosyl flavone rotamer (1) was isolated. The structures of the major (1a) and minor (1b) rotational isomers were determined by extensive NMR analysis and MS/MS fragmentation. Finally, the anti-inflammatory activity of 1 was predicted by molecular docking simulations with IL-8 protein. These results suggested that the compound 1 is a potential therapeutic candidate for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Abstract P175: Benefits Of Gardening For Self-management Of Hypertension Among African-American Men: A Mixed-Methods Analysis

Background: African American men are disproportionately affected by hypertension compared to other racial/ethnic groups. Self-management practices such as following a diet rich in fruits and vegetables can lead to improved hypertension control. However, healthy options may be inaccessible for some African American men, Gardening may provide easy access to fruits and vegetables. Methods: We conducted a mixed-methods study exploring African American men’s experiences with hypertension from Tennessee who regularly engaged in personal or community gardening and their gardening benefits (diet, physical activity, stress management), preferred diets and food selection. Participants completed semi-structured interviews and the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet questionnaire which was compared to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) MyPlate. Results: Participants (N=9, mean age 65 [SD 5.4] years) reported that gardening improved their regular physical activity, stress management, and satisfaction with providing for others. Several themes emerged including that participants preferred to manage their hypertension through diet modification by alternating traditional diets (high fat/sodium) with heart-healthy (low fat/sodium) meals and that they recognized the continuous nature of healthy food selection. Diet questionnaire responses revealed mean daily fruit (2.9 [SD 1.7]) and vegetable (2.8 [SD 1.1]) servings were below DASH diet recommendations but above MyPlate guidelines. Further, mean daily meat/protein (3.7[SD 1.1]) and fat/oil intake (6.4 [SD 7.2]) servings exceeded both recommendations. Conclusion: Our study suggests that personal and community gardening may provide a means for African American men to improve hypertension self-management practices through physical activity, stress relief, and healthy food access. Further studies of gardening interventions on blood pressure control among this group are warranted.

Food insecurity and social capital during COVID-19: A cross-national qualitative study of communities from South Africa and the United States

This study investigates the evolving ways in which social workers helped provide food assistance during the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic in communities in South Africa and the United States. A cross-national qualitative methodology was used to collect data about the nutritional services social workers delivered, the types of social capital used to assist in these efforts, and the challenges they experienced. This study not only highlights differences in the approaches of these two countries but also how these different communities might be able to learn from one another in delivering food relief during times of emergency.

The Utilisation of Africa’s Environmental Resources and the Challenges of Globalisation: A Case Study from Eastern Tanzania

This paper concerns the micro-environment and globalisation nexus. With the effectiveparticipation of the leadership in Morogoro region, Melela village on the leeward side of the Uluguru mountains was identified as an ecologically and economically problem area typified by, among others, periodic drought, crop failure, food shortage and famine, relief food supplies, urban-rural migration, land use conflicts and a community sensitive to agricultural market signals. It is indeed thisstate of affairs that makes Melela village an interesting diagnostic case that calls for in-depth analysis of agro-biodiversity conditions under economic globalisation and indeed for urgent resource planning and management.

Programs Addressing Food Security for First Nations Peoples: A Scoping Review.

Access to food is a right that every individual must have to ensure a standard of living that is sufficient for maintaining good health and wellbeing. This review, developed and implemented by a team of First Nations and non-First Nations peoples, aimed to scope the literature on programs addressing food security for First Nations peoples in Australia, Aotearoa/New Zealand, Canada, and the United States of America. Collectively, First Nations groups share continued traumas, disadvantages, and devastation brought upon them as a result of British colonisation. Despite the impacts of colonial conquest, the resilience of First Nations peoples continues through the fight for self-determination, sovereignty, equity, and equality. Three databases and grey literature were searched from 2010. Two reviewers completed screening, data extraction, and critical appraisal. Nine food security programs were included in this review. Five were from the United States of America and four from Canada, with no program from Australia or Aotearoa/New Zealand meeting the inclusion criteria. The programs that appear to be most suitable for addressing food security for First Nations peoples were participatory in design, had community governance, integrated cultural knowledge and food systems to increase the accessibility and availability of cultural foods, incorporated educational components, and utilized collaborations among various agencies. Findings showed that while it is important to address short-term emergency food relief, the aim should be sustainable food security through a longer-term system and policy change underpinned by co-designed research and evaluation.