Feeding a family in a recession: food insecurity among Minnesota parents

We assessed current levels of food insecurity among a large, diverse sample of parents and examined associations between food insecurity and parental weight status, eating patterns, and the home food environment.

Project F-EAT (Families and Eating and Activity Among Teens) examined the home food environments of adolescents. Parents and caregivers (n = 2095) living with adolescents from the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota school districts completed mailed surveys during a 12-month period in 2009-2010. We performed our assessments using multivariate regressions.

Almost 39% of the parents and caregivers experienced household food insecurity, whereas 13% experienced very low food security. Food insecurity was significantly associated with poorer nutrition-related variables such as higher rates of parental overweight and obesity, less healthy foods served at meals, and higher rates of binge eating. Food-insecure parents were 2 to 4 times more likely to report barriers to accessing fruits and vegetables.

Food insecurity was highly prevalent. Environmental interventions are needed to protect vulnerable families against food insecurity and to improve access to affordable, healthy foods.