*Preface: This is an excerpt during my time on project in which I ate on $4.23/day as a healthy, whole-food challenge and traveled around the country volunteering at homeless shelters and food banks. I also camped wherever I went and essentially simulated homelessness. This is documenter further on 423aday.com*
Let’s define some terms.
The poverty threshold in America is based upon the number of people in a household. For one person: $11,880; two: $16,020; four: $24,300. (for more stats visit: http://obamacarefacts.com/federal-poverty-level/)
According to the USDA, food insecurity is “limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods or limited or uncertain ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways.”
Poverty and food insecurity are not necessarily interchangeable. One can be in poverty, but not necessarily food insecure, and vice versa.
All of the following statistics (unless otherwise specified) are from the 2014 census, as these are the most recent facts I can access.
48.1 million Americans lived in food insecure households, comprised of 32.8 million adults and 15.3 million children.
14% of households were food insecure, which means about one out of every seven homes are food insecure. That is an extraordinary amount, you all. One out of seven. Also, about one out of every 14 or 15 households experience extreme food insecurity.
I noticed many of the states with the highest food insecurity rates also happen to have some of the highest obesity rates. I know correlation doesn’t mean causation. But it makes me wonder (as others have), if this lack of access to food in general and especially to healthy, whole foods is contributing to obesity. I know the lack of access to food in general seems contradictory when discussing obesity, but food insecurity, by definition includes not having access to “nutritionally adequate” foods.
People are overfed and undernourished.
States with the highest food insecurity in descending order: Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Texas, Ohio, Alabama, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Maine, Oregon and Kansas.
States with the highest rates of obesity in descending order: Arkansas, West Virginia, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Oklahoma, Indiana, Ohio, North Dakota, South Carolina.
(Come on, Southern folk. We can do better than this!)
I also noticed that the races with the highest rates of poverty, blacks and hispanics, also tend to have the highest rates of obesity. 47.8% of blacks and 42.5% of hispanics are obese (just for fun-fact funsies: 32.6% of whites and 10.8% of Asians are obese). The fact that one in three non-hispanic whites are obese is still astronomical (and evidently we have something to learn from our Asian friends.)
When you don’t have enough food, or enough money in general, you are forced to choose between certain goods and services. You maybe have to choose between food and electricity, food and a place to live, food and healthcare, or any combination of the aforementioned, as well as clothing, hygiene products, and cleaning supplies for the home.
If you don’t have the proper healthcare or even the proper hygiene products, you are far more susceptible to a multitude of diseases and other negative health aspects.
So what do we do about this? We should lower the prices of healthy foods, right? Fruits and vegetables should be more affordable. What is affordable? And what about the growers of the food? What do they get paid? And no, I don’t just mean the owners of the farms (“farmers”) but the actual hired workers on the farm. Some of the poorest people in America are often those farming and producing the crops for our families.
This is a separate issue, but people who are suffering from food insecurity or living in poverty might want to consider ruling out certain unnecessary things of life…like cable, video games, etc. I know, I have no right to say that. But I live without these luxeries, and I think I’m doing pretty well. I don’t just mean I lived this way on the road, but in general, when at home.
One aspect we all need to be highly aware of is: food waste. It is estimated that 40% of all grown, processed and transported food in the United States is never consumed or used. 40 PERCENT. Holy granola, that is an exorbitant amount of food, you all. Also, overall, about one third of food produced in the world is either lost or wasted. (endfoodwastenow.org). We can do better than this. I can do better than this. We have to do better than this.
95% of much of the food we waste goes into the landfill, which in turn leads to the production of methane. I used to think wasted food didn’t cause much of a problem, as it will just breakdown like it would in a compost pile right? Wrong. When I visited the landfill in Salt Lake City, Utah, I learned that each day an additional layer of soil (and maybe other material) is added on top, which keeps odors in and prevents litter from flying about. But because there is no sunlight or oxygen reaching the food, the waste breaks down anaerobically thereby producing methane, which negatively effects our environment, specifically through global warming (even though some may think thats not a “real thing.”)
Outside of the methane issue, all the water, manpower and other resources to produce that food also completely went to waste. We all need to be aware of our consumption habits, including that which we dispose of.
Everything is connected. Our world is connected. The things you buy, the food, the goods, the services. What you throw away, what you consume. Who grew and picked the food you ate? How much did they get paid? Who made that shirt you’re wearing and what are their wages like?
The past couple of days I haven’t had a car and my bike isn’t functioning well, so I’ve mostly been venturing around on feet. With this, I made an excuse for myself not to abide by the $4.23/day budget because the only places I could obtain foods were gas stations, small markets and a Walgreens. I also didn’t have access to my two camp stoves, pots, pans, containers, bowls, plates, etc. as I didn't want to be hauling those around with me everywhere. Biking/walking to my “hotel” from the Toyota dealership was hilarious enough with the two large bags full of computer and camera equipment, books and a few items of clothing. (I didn't bring enough underwear, but I had plenty of reading material #priorities.)
If you don’t have a car, and you're in an area that doesn't have a real grocery store, it’s going to be extraordinarily difficult to eat healthily on a regular basis.
I guess I could have biked to Walmart 10 miles away, but then I would have to haul all the groceries back, which might be rather difficult, and walking all the groceries back sure wouldn’t be peachy either.
I don’t really know how to remedy this situation. I can say that I want to make healthy, whole food available to everyone, everywhere (geographically) to all socioeconomic levels, but this “want” isn't making a change. But maybe this trip isn't just about making a change. It’s about bringing awareness (including to myself) about what's going on around us on a daily, even moment-to-moment basis.