Food Reference Budgets as a Potential Policy Tool to Address Food Insecurity: Lessons Learned from a Pilot Study in 26 European Countries

Álvarez, Elena Carrillo; Penne, Tess; Boeckx, Hilde; Storms, Bérénice; Goedemé, Tim

doi:10.3390/ijerph16010032

Cited by 17 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…There is a key role for academia to provide the evidence base and independent voice to inform and evaluate policy and programs and to challenge existing paradigms and assumptions. The International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health Special Issue on Addressing Food Insecurity in Developed Countries is a good example of how the research community can come together to provide evidence to guide policy and practice [66,67,68,69,70,71,72,73,74,75,76,77,78,79,80,81,82,83,84,85,86]. There are many opportunities for academics to partner with government, industry, and the third sector to translate research to practice to improve the lives of people rendered food insecure in rich nations.…”

Section: What Should or Could Be Done And By Whommentioning

confidence: 99%

Food Insecurity and Hunger in Rich Countries—It Is Time for Action against Inequality

Pollard

Booth

2019

IJERPH

191

111

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Household food insecurity is a serious public health concern in rich countries with developed economies closely associated with inequality. The prevalence of household food insecurity is relatively high in some developed countries, ranging from 8 to 20% of the population. Human rights approaches have the potential to address the structural causes, not just the symptoms of food insecurity. Despite most developed countries ratifying the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights over 40 years ago, food insecurity rates suggest current social protections are inadequate. The contemporary framing of the solution to food insecurity in developed countries is that of diverting food waste to the hungry to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals agenda (Goals 2 and 12.3). An estimated 60 million people or 7.2% of the population in high income countries used food banks in 2013. Although providing food assistance to those who are hungry is an important strategy, the current focus distracts attention away from the ineffectiveness of government policies in addressing the social determinants of food insecurity. Much of the action needed to improve household food security falls to actors outside the health sector. There is evidence of promising actions to address the social determinants of food insecurity in some developed countries. Learning from these, there is a strong case for government leadership, for action within and across government, and effective engagement with other sectors to deliver a coordinated, collaborative, and cooperative response to finding pathways out of food insecurity.

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Section: What Should or Could Be Done And By Whommentioning

confidence: 99%

Food Insecurity and Hunger in Rich Countries—It Is Time for Action against Inequality

Pollard

Booth

2019

IJERPH

191

111

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“…At the institutional level, food safety net programs, changes in those services post-disaster, and civic and social institutional roles in food provision influence food security [53][54][55][56][57]. Finally, at the policy and societal level, the allocation of resources as well as social, economic, and political forces influence food insecurity outcomes for communities [58,59]. The present analysis applies a socioecological framework to examine factors at the individual, household, and social levels of influence following Hurricane Harvey in Texas.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Factors Associated with Food Insecurity Following Hurricane Harvey in Texas

Clay

Ross

2020

IJERPH

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Food insecurity prevalence among disaster-affected households has been found to be higher than state prevalence in non-disaster times. This study applies a socio-ecological model of post-disaster food insecurity to a nested quota sample (n = 1002) recruited for a web survey from 41 Texas counties affected by Hurricane Harvey 12-15 months post-event. This analysis identifies risk and protective factors for food insecurity. Chi-square analysis was used to examine independent associations between individual, household, and social factors with food insecurity. A multivariate logistic model was fitted and adjusted odds ratios are reported. Economic instability (adjusted odds ratio (OR) 2.43; 95% Confidence Interval (CI) 1.73, 3.41), relocation due to Hurricane Harvey (OR 1.89; CI 1.15, 3.09), major home damage (OR 2.11; CI 1.12, 3.98), non-white race -black (OR 1.79; CI 1.01, 3.18), Hispanic (OR 1.67; CI 1.09, 2.54), other race (OR 4.39; CI 1.96, 9.82) -and community-based organization assistance (1.99; 1.11, 3.58) were risk factors while older age (45-64 years: 0.49; 0.32, 0.73; 65+ years 0.40; 0.22, 0.75), better physical health (0.46; 0.29, 0.71), better mental health (0.46; 0.32, 0.67), and high social support (0.37; 0.25, 0.55) were protective against food insecurity. Disaster policies and programs should address the disproportionate burden on households that relocate or have health conditions. Fostering social support networks, especially among relocated populations, may improve disaster health outcomes.

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“…These needs are translated into concrete baskets containing lists of essential goods and services (see "Appendix" Table 2 for a list of broad categories of included goods and services in the Belgium context) based on various information sources such as (inter)national guidelines, expert knowledge and focus group discussions with citizens from various socioeconomic backgrounds (Cf. Carrillo-Álvarez et al 2019;Goedemé et al 2015a, b). The latter are used to validate the theoretical framework and assumptions, to define essential goods and services and to assess the acceptability and feasibility of the budgets within the current societal and institutional context.…”

Section: A Hypothetical Household Methods To Simulate Out-of-pocket Comentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The paper shows that Reference Budgets (RBs) offer such an operationalization of an acceptable living standard by defining what people need at the minimum in order to participate adequately in society, taking into account the institutional, cultural and social context (e.g. Carrillo-Álvarez et al 2019;Goedemé et al 2015a, b). Doing this, RBs assess the out-of-pocket costs that specific household types face to access essential goods and services, taking into account the impact of public provisions or subsidies and cost-reducing measures (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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2019

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The right to adequate minimum income protection is one of the key principles included in the European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR). The EPSR takes a right-based and normative approach, aiming specifically at fulfilling people's essential needs, not only by guaranteeing sufficiently high income levels, but also by promoting labour market inclusion and access to affordable goods and services of good quality. This paper takes the EPSR as a starting point to propose a needs-based indicator that assesses the adequacy of minimum income protection including these three dimensions in a comprehensive way. We argue that Reference Budgets (RBs), priced baskets of goods and services that represent an adequate living standard, are well-suited to construct such an indicator. To illustrate this empirically, we use RBs for adequate social participation in Belgium which have been constructed for the first time in 2008 and have been regularly updated since then. Through a combination of hypothetical household simulations of essential out-of-pocket costs and designated taxbenefits for families living on different minimum income schemes, we are able to assess the adequacy of minimum income protection for a range of household types over the period 2008-2017. The paper shows that, the proposed indicator is a useful policy tool for both ex-ante and ex-post evaluations of the adequacy of social policy measures in light of the social protection and inclusion rights included in the Pillar.

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Food Reference Budgets as a Potential Policy Tool to Address Food Insecurity: Lessons Learned from a Pilot Study in 26 European Countries

Cited by 17 publications

References 25 publications

Food Insecurity and Hunger in Rich Countries—It Is Time for Action against Inequality

Food Insecurity and Hunger in Rich Countries—It Is Time for Action against Inequality

Factors Associated with Food Insecurity Following Hurricane Harvey in Texas

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