Abstract

Social Inclusion and Food Security

Lynn McIntyre
Dalhousie University

Food insecurity is briefly defined as the lack of access to adequate food through socially acceptable means. Hunger, conceptually and universally has three elements: it is about suffering; it is about absolute poverty and the consequences of relative deprivation; and it is about political dismissal of a fundamental abrogation of human rights. Just as the child poverty agenda is shifting to a family poverty agenda, the social inclusion framework is helpful in shifting attitudes from child hunger to family hunger. Because the framework cares about pathways, we can now examine the processes that lead individuals and families into hunger and understand the multi-dimensionality of deprivation that characterizes the lives of people living in food insecure situations. However, there are concerns with this framework. The social inclusion framework stresses the use of both economic and social development processes to create an inclusive community. This is one means to the end—another might be to act collectively upon hunger as a fundamental human rights issue. The social inclusion agenda speaks about social capital building and the value of social investment for productivity and other progress gains. Surely adequate food is about fundamental dignity of the person first, and their social utility second. Lastly, the participation of marginalized persons and hearing their voices in policy formation is a key social inclusion concept. One must be careful that mandatory empowerment does not override a fundamental respect for autonomy.

A brief social history of food insecurity in Canada is presented that concludes that since 1989, we have failed to significantly address the issue despite a high level of public awareness. Today, the best estimate of the number of Canadians who are food insecure is 8% or 2.3 million households with 10% of households with children, or 678,000 children, affected. Other data are presented on the sociodemographic predictors of hunger, coping strategies, dietary consequences, the fluidity of hungry families, and the effects of certain income transfer policies on hunger. Seven research needs and gaps are described including income elasticity and income threshold.studies, public investments to eliminate food insecurity, a study of public attitudes, price controls on staples such as fluid milk, hunger dynamics among poorly studied food insecure groups, and quantification of the ‘food security dividend’.

Back to Papers

For more information about the conference, contact:
 
Sarah Zgraggen
The Willow Group
Tel: (613) 722-8796;
Fax: (613) 729-6206;
e-mail: szgraggen@thewillowgroup.com