Dataset Information

SNAP Participants Improved Food Security And Diet After A Full-Service Supermarket Opened In An Urban Food Desert.

ABSTRACT: The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is the largest US food and nutrition assistance program, tasked with improving food security among low-income households. Another federal effort to improve food access is the Healthy Food Financing Initiative (HFFI), which invested tens of millions of dollars to incentivize healthy food retail outlets in areas lacking access to nutritious, fresh food. We explore the intersection of these programs, testing the impact of a new, HFFI-financed full-service supermarket on SNAP participants in an urban food desert. After the supermarket's opening, SNAP participants' food security improved and intake of added sugars declined in the intervention neighborhood, but both were unchanged in a comparison neighborhood without a new supermarket. Intervention neighborhood participants also experienced relative declines in the percentage of daily calories from solid fats, alcoholic beverages, and added sugars. Our findings suggest that HFFI amplifies the effects of SNAP participation on improving food security and dietary quality in food deserts.

SUBMITTER: Cantor J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8237564 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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SNAP Participants Improved Food Security And Diet After A Full-Service Supermarket Opened In An Urban Food Desert.

Cantor Jonathan J Beckman Robin R Collins Rebecca L RL Dastidar Madhumita Ghosh MG Richardson Andrea S AS Dubowitz Tamara T

Health affairs (Project Hope) 20200801 8

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is the largest US food and nutrition assistance program, tasked with improving food security among low-income households. Another federal effort to improve food access is the Healthy Food Financing Initiative (HFFI), which invested tens of millions of dollars to incentivize healthy food retail outlets in areas lacking access to nutritious, fresh food. We explore the intersection of these programs, testing the impact of a new, HFFI-financed ful ...[more]

PMID: 32744934

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Project description:IntroductionMobile food markets may help to mitigate diet-related and weight-related inequities by bringing low-cost, nutritious food directly to underserved populations. By stocking foods to meet a range of dietary needs, full-service mobile markets may improve multiple aspects of diet, food security and fruit and vegetable procurement with a convenient one-stop shop.Methods and analysisThis cluster randomised trial is evaluating the impact of a full-service mobile market, the Twin Cities Mobile Market (TCMM). The TCMM sells staple foods at affordable prices from a retrofitted bus that regularly visits communities experiencing low incomes. The trial's primary outcome is participant diet quality. Secondary outcomes include intake of specific foods and nutrients, food security and servings of fruits and vegetables procured for the home.Together with our partners, we enrolled four subsidised community housing sites in three waves (12 total sites), aimed to recruit 22 participants per site (N=264) and collected baseline data. Sites were then randomised to either receive the full-service TCMM intervention or serve as a waitlist control, and the full-service TCMM began implementing at intervention sites. Follow-up data collection is occurring at 6 months post-implementation. After follow-up data collection for each wave, the full-service TCMM intervention is being implemented at the waitlist control sites. Waves 1 and 2 are complete and Wave 3 is in progress.At baseline and follow-up data collection, dietary quality and intake are being assessed through three, interviewer-administered, 24-hour dietary recalls, food insecurity is being assessed by the 18-item Food Security Screening Module and fruit and vegetable procurement is being measured by collecting one month of food procurement tracking forms.We will use intent-to-treat analyses to determine if participant diet quality, food security and procurement of fruits and vegetables improve in the sites that received the full-service TCMM intervention relative to the participants in the waitlist control condition.Ethics and disseminationTrial procedures have been approved by the University of Minnesota Institutional Review Board. We plan to disseminate main outcomes in Grant Year 5 in both scientific and community spaces.Trial registration numberClinicalTrials.gov: NCT05672186.

Project description:BackgroundFood insecurity is a major global public health issue. Social capital has been identified as central to maintaining food security across a wide range of low- and middle-income country contexts, but few studies have examined this relationship through sociocentric network analysis.ObjectiveWe investigated relationships between household- and community-level social connectedness, household food security, and household income; and tested the hypothesis that social connectedness modified the relationship between income and food security.MethodsA cross-sectional census with an embedded questionnaire to capture social relationships was conducted among eleven peri-urban communities. Community connectedness was related to study outcomes of food security and per-capita income through regression models.ResultsOf 1520 households identified, 1383 were interviewed (91.0%) and 1272 (83.9%) provided complete data. Households in the youngest communities had the most total contacts, and the highest proportion of contacts outside of the community. Household income was also associated with more outside-community contacts (0.05 more contacts per standard deviation increase in income, p<0.001).Less food secure households reported more contacts nearby (0.24 increase in household food insecurity access scale (HFIAS) for each additional contact, p<0.001). After adjusting for household-level socioeconomic status, membership in an older, larger, and better-connected community, with a greater proportion of residents engaged in rural livelihood strategies, was associated with greater food security (-0.92 decrease in HFIAS for each one-unit increase in community mean degree, p=0.008). There was no evidence that social connectedness modified the relationship between income and food security such that lower-income households benefited more from community membership than higher-income households.ConclusionsAlthough households reported networks that spanned rural villages and urban centers, contacts within the community, with whom food was regularly shared, were most important to maintaining food security. Interventions that build within-community connectedness in peri-urban settings may increase food security.

Dataset Information

SNAP Participants Improved Food Security And Diet After A Full-Service Supermarket Opened In An Urban Food Desert.

Publications

SNAP Participants Improved Food Security And Diet After A Full-Service Supermarket Opened In An Urban Food Desert.

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