Opinion: People with food insecurity deserve better nutrition education
Food literacy skills and nutrition knowledge make a lifelong impact in improving health and quality of life for food-insecure communities.
Since spring 2022, a flood of migrants fleeing political instability in Venezuela — about 136,000 — have settled in Queens, New York, and are in desperate need of food and other resources. The surging migrant population has led to depleted food pantries in the borough; as of June 2023, more than 20.5% of Queens residents are experiencing food insecurity. They may be physically safe, but are swept into the new challenge of hunger.
Food insecurity, defined as a lack of access to a sufficient quantity of nutritious food, is a growing public health problem in the United States. In 2019, according to the Department of Agriculture, 35.2 million in the U.S. lived in food-insecure homes, with higher rates in single parent households and households of color. In 2022, that number rose to 44.2 million. Many of these households are also lacking something that could help them combat food insecurity: nutrition education.
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