Three Ways To Reduce Childhood Food Insecurity

New research, using simulation modeling, identifies three policies that ensure young children have reliable access to food.


●    Increasing SNAP benefits by basing benefit calculations on the Low Cost Food Plan (vs. the Thrifty Food Plan), gives participant families with children 8% more  food purchasing power, and  helps 5.31% of food-insecure people in those families to become food secure.

●    Increasing WIC age-eligibility from age 5 to 6, increases the food purchasing power of 1.47% of newly eligible 5-year-olds’ families, helping them to become food secure.

●    Maintaining the current Community Eligibility Program (CEP) criteria (>40% poverty rate) in the National School Lunch and Breakfast Programs, assures that the food purchasing power of 3.17% and 3.77% of families with children who participate in free and reduced-price meals, respectively, shift into higher income-to-poverty-ratio categories. Consequently, 3.23% of food-insecure School Meals participants’ families became fully food secure.

Source: Children’s Health Policy, 11/16/17, Reducing Food Insecurity