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Factors protecting against and contributing to food insecurity among rural families.

Article Excerpt
Food insecurity and hunger of nationally representative samples of the U.S. population have been assessed annually since 1995 as part of the Current Population Survey (CPS). For the year ending September 2001, the prevalence of food insecurity in nonmetropolitan (1) households was 11.5 percent, compared with 7.7 percent in metropolitan households outside central cities (Nord, Andrews, & Carlson, 2002). Nationally, 10.7 percent of all households (11.5 million) were food insecure during this period; 7.4 percent (8 million), food insecure without hunger; and 3.3 percent (3.5 million), food insecure with hunger. Food insecurity occurs "whenever the availability of nutritionally adequate and safe food or the ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways is limited or uncertain" (Anderson, 1990, p. 1560). Hunger, a narrower and more severe form of deprivation, is defined as "the painful or uneasy sensation caused by a lack of food" (Anderson, 1990, p. 1560).

Rural areas have some unique characteristics affecting food availability and acquisition that might contribute to the higher prevalence of food insecurity in nonmetropolitan areas--including the limited number of supermarkets, limited availability of food items, and high relative costs of tbod (Morris, Neuhauser, & Campbell, 1992). Thus, one might expect that families in rural areas with greater skills in managing money and in accessing alternative food sources would be better able to meet their food needs and be more food secure than would be those with comparable incomes who lack these skills. Stronger and more geographically proximate extended family ties in rural areas might mitigate food insecurity. Lower costs of housing, typically the largest share of the family budget, might free more financial resources for food acquisition, thus decreasing food insecurity in rural areas.

In 1993, Rank and Hirschl showed that qualified families in rural areas were much less likely to participate in the Food Stamp Program than were urban families because of their negative attitudes toward welfare and lack of information about such programs. McConnell and Ohls (2002) reviewed survey and focus group data on participation in the Food Stamp Program by urban, suburban, and rural populations to determine whether particular barriers to program participation existed for rural households. These researchers found that a lack of understanding or awareness of eligibility was greater among rural food-stamp-eligible individuals, compared with their urban counterparts. Few investigators, however, have closely examined families' knowledge about community resources, including food assistance programs, as a factor protecting against food insecurity.

Using 1995-99 CPS data from non-metropolitan counties, Nord (2002) found no significant change in food insecurity and hunger across the period among low-income families (i.e., those with incomes that were less than 130 percent of the poverty level) receiving food stamps. But he did find that among low-income families not receiving food stamps, food insecurity increased significantly: from 19.6 to 23.9 percent. This finding could indicate a protective effect that participation in the Food Stamp Program has against food insecurity in nonmetropolitan counties.

Previous research in a rural, upstate New York county showed that several household factors were related significantly to food insecurity: measures of wealth (i.e., having savings and owning a home), economic security and income-earning potential, financial resources/'or food acquisition (i.e., money to buy food), and access to "free" food from employers or Mother Nature (Olson, Ranschenbach, Frongillo, & Kendall, 1997). This previous research was not designed, however, to examine closely the key influences on food acquisition in Campbell's (1991) conceptualization of food insecurity and its risk factors: the human resources of households and the extent to which nonfood expenditures divert financial and human resources from food acquisition. Human capital theory (Becker, 1993) suggests that having human resources such as health, knowledge, and skills may protect against adverse outcomes such as food insecurity.

The research reported here explores the influence of two sets of factors on the food security status of a household: (1) the human resources of a household and (2) the diversion of financial resources from food acquisition. The goal is to identify characteristics of food-insecure rural households and household members.

Methods

Study Sample

The sample consisted of 316 rural low-income families from 24 counties in 14 States (fig. 1). These families participated in the first wave of the multi-State...

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