Mariana Chilton argues that food insecurity is created and maintained by people in power. Taking the reader back to the original wounds in the United States caused by its history of colonization, genocide, and enslavement, she forces us to reckon with hard questions about why people in the US allow hunger to persist.

This article explores the affordability gap, or the difference between a household’s actual spending on food and the lowest cost of meeting nutrient needs for that household. The authors of this study look to advance previous research from the Fill the Nutrient Gap analyses done by the World Food Programme. They encourage tracking and monitoring of the affordability gap to support better social assistance programs to make nutrient-adequate diets more affordable. 

This paper explores the impact of recent spikes in food prices on poverty in lower-middle income countries (LMICs). It is often claimed that food price increases negatively affect the poor because they already spend a higher proportion of their total income on food. However, this paper takes into account the stimulation of great food production from higher prices and the effect this has on poverty.

Low-income families residing in food deserts in the US face significant systemic barriers that limit access to affordable and nutritious food. This action research study took as its case study an evolving social enterprise, Food Forward, to examine how marginalized community members engage, build capacities, and exercise agency in the social innovation of food systems, and to identify early indicators of changes in food behaviour.

This report by the UK’s Food Foundation examines the challenges faced by families in the UK who are unable to access certain public services as a result of the “No Recourse to Public Funds” (NRPF) conditions attached to their immigration status, for example while seeking asylum. Based on interviews with affected families, the study finds that the hostile environment towards immigrants created by UK government policy contributes to a “state of perpetual instability” in relation to people’s ability to access adequate shelter and income - and hence contributing to food insecurity and dietary inequalities.

This paper argues that “agriculture for nutrition” interventions in low and middle income countries are overly narrow in scope and neglect the wider political, economic, social and cultural factors that affect food and (mal)nutrition.

The Scientific Advisory Board on Agricultural Policy, Food and Consumer Health Protection to the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture has just released an English version of a report on promoting more sustainable food consumption. The report, originally published in 2020 in German, defines policies that integrate consideration of four areas: human health, social aspects, the environment (including climate) and animal welfare. It focuses on designing food environments to support consumers in choosing healthy, sustainable diets.

In the UK, average prices for a representative “basket” of food and non-alcoholic beverages have risen by 14.6% in the 12 months to September 2022, driven in particular by increases in the prices of bread and cereals, meat, milk, cheese and eggs. The statistics are from the UK’s Office for National Statistics.

This report by The Food Foundation sets out the state of the UK’s food system, covering the areas of food affordability, availability and appeal. Headline findings include: the poorest fifth of households would need to spend 47% of their disposable income to afford the Government’s recommended healthy diet, compared to 11% for the richest fifth; a greater proportion (22%) of workers in the food system earn minimum wage or less, compared to 8% across the whole UK; healthier foods are nearly three times more expensive per calorie than less healthy foods; and plant-based milks are on average 60% more expensive than dairy milk.