Shameful Statistics

When was the last time you were hungry?

If you’re like most people, it was probably when you woke up this morning. Unless you’re one of those odd folks who sleepwalks and you happened to raid the fridge in the middle of the night, you likely had dinner last night, went to bed, and woke up with a bit of an appetite. So you probably had a bowl of cereal or scrambled an egg or something.

And you probably didn’t think much about it.

But if you were a member of one of the 17.6 million households in America that deals with food insecurity on a regular basis, you would have given it a tremendous amount of thought. Because in a food insecure household, there’s no guarantee that cereal or eggs or any other kind of food is going to be available all the time. And for those people, there’s a lot of thought and worry that goes into figuring out how to feed themselves and their families.

Food insecurity, as defined by the organization No Kid Hungry, is “the limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe food.” As the chart below indicates, it’s a problem for many people. Maybe not for you or me, but for roughly 20% of the population. That’s a lot of people!

The fact is that this problem exists here in the United States, despite our being one of the wealthiest nations in the world, with an abundance of resources at our disposal. There is not a lack of food available in America, but for the roughly 20% of American households who experience food insecurity, there is frequently a lack of money to buy food, or a lack of access to food sources.

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) provides food and nutrition assistance programs to low-income families on a regular basis, but that organization’s budget, and thus, its ability to assist, is under the control of Congress. And Congress, as it is currently configured, seems more intent on voting to support its own best interests, rather than those of the constituents who they represent.

The farm bill that funds the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP, once known as the Food Stamp program) was renewed in February this year, but only after a substantial budget cut was made, and $9 billion dollars was sucked out of the SNAP budget. This means that about one million needy families who now receive SNAP assistance have had to adjust to a reduction in benefits of about $90 per month. About a week's worth of groceries.

I don’t have an answer, but I’m certainly going to be looking for one. What’s the old saying? If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem?

I want to be part of the solution.

References:

No Kid Hungry. (2013). Hunger Facts. Retrieved from: http://www.nokidhungry.org/problem/hunger-facts

United States Department of Agriculture. (2014). Key Statistics and Graphics. Retrieved from: http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/food-nutrition-assistance/food-security-in-the-us/key-statistics-graphics.aspx#.U5orYfldWSo