Examining food insecurity among adults in Australia
Food and nutrition insecurity occurs when the availability of and access to healthy and safe food is compromised, or when such foods cannot be acquired by socially acceptable means. In high-income countries, food insecurity is often measured at the household level based on inadequate access to food due to financial constraints. However, this is a complex and multifaceted issue impacted by a range of different factors besides financial access, which results in household food insecurity (HFI) being under-acknowledged as a significant public health problem in high-income countries like Australia.
The socioeconomic and demographic factors contributing to the risk of HFI include income, employment status, and education, which in turn influence the health and well-being of men and women differently. In fact, women and female-headed households are 75% more likely to report HFI, which can be explained by the disproportionate rates of single-parents, underemployment, and lower incomes compared to their male counterparts. Moreover, women might more accurately report HFI than men, as they are more likely to take on the responsibility of food acquisition and preparation as part of traditional gender norms in society. With this role, the female population potentially has higher levels of food literacy, including food-related skills and nutrition knowledge, which contribute to their higher HFI rate. This is because one of the main dimensions that underpins food security is the utilisation of food, which requires sufficient knowledge and basic sanitary conditions to prepare food.
Drawing on these preliminary findings, this study aims to explore the prevalence of HFI and to examine the intersection between gender, education, nutrition knowledge, and HFI status in Australia as a high-income country. Specifically, it hypothesised that less educated and lower-income women who are primarily responsible for food acquisition and preparation would be more likely to report HFI. Moreover, primary food preparers with better nutrition knowledge are also hypothesized to be less likely to report HFI. The results of this study
would inform the development of policy and interventions that possibly mitigate the severity and ubiquity of food insecurity.
Method and sample
This cross-sectional study involves the recruitment of a targeted sample of Australians over 16 years old from both metropolitan and regional areas, who identified as having primary responsibility for sourcing and providing food in their households. A self-administered, online survey was uploaded to QualtricsTM and deployed through Facebook to recruit participants, sampled using the snowball and purposive approaches. A consumer panel generated through QualtricsTM was also applied to the sample to represent the gender, income, and location of the national demographics. The data collected include general sociodemographic and geographic information, food security status, and nutrition knowledge of the participants, using previously validated scales and questions, and were analysed in IBM SPSS version 23.
Key findings
- The results showed that men report higher rates of HFI compared to women, and these rates were higher compared to findings from previous studies in more disadvantaged areas in Sydney and Brisbane.
- Gender may moderate associations between education, nutrition knowledge, and food security. Specifically, education was significantly associated with food security among women, but not among men. Conversely, nutrition knowledge was only significantly associated with reporting HFI among men, but not among women.
- Other factors such as age and living arrangement are also linked to food security. This study found an inverse association between age and food security among men, which possibly indicates an increased resilience to food insecurity or heightened reservations to correctly report HFI in fear of social consequences as men age. Moreover, those who were single and lived alone with no children were at greater risk of HFI (threefold higher among men and double among women) compared to those living as couples with children.
Recommendations
Based on these findings, this study emphasised that food insecurity is a complex issue. Therefore, efforts to address HFI need to extend beyond interventions that only focus on individual behaviour change, to address the underlying social determinants. It then recommends strategies such as improving nutrition knowledge and food literacy, and these efforts should be tailored to gender and household structure. Specifically, nutrition and food literacy programs that build personal skills may be combined with other tactics and targeted towards certain demographic groups to maximise its effectiveness.
Researcher
More information
The research article is also available on eprints.