Food Insecurity and Affecting Factors in Households With Children During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

Objective: To examine the incidence of food insecurity and affecting factors in households with children in Turkey during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design: This is a cross-sectional study. Setting: The participants were recruited by the snowball sampling method and the data were collected via a link sent to their smart mobile phones through their social media accounts. Participants: This study included 211 households with at least one child. Results: The study revealed that 21.8% households had food insecurity that was not at the hunger threshold. The monthly income of 80.6% of the households was below the poverty line and monthly income decreased in more than half of the households during the pandemic. Food insecurity increased 2.5 times when the households comprised workers or self-employed individuals (OR=2.529, p=0.002), increased 3 times when the monthly income of the households decreased (OR=3.131, p=0.000), and increased 2 times when total monthly income of the household fell below poverty line during the pandemic (OR=2.001, p=0.049). Conclusion: It is determined that nearly half the households have food insecurity and that the pandemic poses a risk in terms of food security. We recommend that public health studies should be planned to ensure accessibility to healthy foods.

Perspective: Food and Nutrition Insecurity in Europe: Challenges and Opportunities for Dietitians

“…Beyond data on the rate of food insecurity in different groups, several studies have examined risk factors and correlations for food insecurity (for example, [63,65,94,96,97,100,101,[114][115][116]), revealing its association with structural conditions such as poverty, unemployment or low work intensity or employment precarity, housing tenure, low incomes, and low levels of education. The increase in food insecurity risk in households headed by women and those with children is well-documented [117][118][119][120], and new research is emerging on its prevalence among youth [96,116] and older adults [97,121].…”

Evaluation of the emergency nutrition response in Malatya after Türkiye–Syria earthquake

“…The latest estimated national food insecurity was reported to be 16 % in 2017 according to the Türkiye Nutrition and Health Survey (TNHS) (7) . However, vulnerable groups such as immigrants or low-income populations were documented to have a food insecurity prevalence of up to 60 % (7,8) . In the FAO of the United Nations’ The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report, Türkiye with its Syrian refugees was listed among the twenty-two countries in a food crisis situation where conflict is the main driver of acute food insecurity (9) .…”

Prevalence and associated factors of food insecurity during COVID-19 pandemic in Bangkok, Thailand : a cross-sectional study

“…In Turkey, eighty-six percent of families had monthly incomes below the poverty level which revealed that the pandemic resulted in the loss of at least one employment in one out of every six families, and that more than half of households saw a decrease in monthly income. The studies also suggested that food insecurity increased 2.5 times when the occupation of the household employees was worker or self-employed (Bulucu Büyüksoy et al, 2021). It surged 3.1 times in response to a fall in the household's monthly income.…”

“…The type of occupation also plays a critical role in influencing food insecurity. In Turkey, the prevalence is 2.5 times higher among labour-workers and self-employed, which might be explained by the lack of employee wages insurance and workers protection law from the government (Bulucu Büyüksoy et al, 2021;Giacoman et al, 2021). In addition, findings from two developed nations the UK.…”

“…Hence, an effective measure for identifying vulnerable families is the household's poverty level as assessed against a defined criterion or 'poverty-line' (FAO, 2003a). A large number of international survey and researches include poverty line as a measurement tool amongst household population including the U.S. Census Household Pulse Survey 2021, the IRIS Composite Survey Household Questionnaire (2004) in Bangladesh and Uganda, and The Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) (Alcaraz V & Zeller, 2007;Bulucu Büyüksoy et al, 2021;Nagata et al, 2021). According to FAO (2003a) these are the thee characteristics of 'poor or vulnerable' household:…”