Food Insecurity

Food insecurity is a contentious issue; attempts to define it align with particular approaches to what should be done. Most fundamentally, food insecurity indicates a lack of access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food. The U.S. General Accounting Office indicates that up to 2 billion people worldwide are food insecure. According to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), 75% of the world’s food-insecure people are located in rural areas, predominantly in the global South. In this context, food insecurity is synonymous with hunger.

[Page 574]Food insecurity also exists in industrialized nations, largely among low-income communities and communities of color. In the United States, approximately 15% of all households, or 45 million Americans, have reported experiencing food insecurity at some point in the preceding year. U.S. ...