The Food Areas Of The United States Essay

(Love & Das, 2016, para. 7). However, Love and Das (2016) expound on the inefficiency of this solution by stating that it “does not bridge the gaps to healthy food” because of their inability to invest in the community and understand their needs (para 12). Using vivid language throughout the article, the authors make their point emotionally impactful by emphasizing that big-chain grocery stores “lur[ed…] to the hood” leave when they no longer profit from maintaining a store in these neighborhoods (Love & Das, 2016, para. 9). Rightfully criticizing the existing solution, the authors expose the superficiality and inefficient manner of only bringing in more stores into neighborhoods. Moreover, by criticizing the superficiality of the existing solution, the authors suggest that eliminating food deserts involves a more personal investment into the betterment of the community. Overall, Love and Das permit the readers to gain an emotional insight on the impact food deserts have on low-income populations and understand the limiting nutrition conditions by appealing to

A food desert is a location in which a wide variety of nutrition food is not generally available (Wrigley et al. 261). Food deserts exist in places such as inner cities and isolated rural areas (Morton and Blanchard 1). Food deserts do not exist because of unfairness against the poor, but because of constraints related to supply and demand. Even though based on the statement that food deserts contain a preponderance of unhealthy food; because such food is all people in food deserts have to choose from is an unsupported statement. The main implication of this conclusion is that the answer to the food deserts is not for the government to interfere with the economics of the food business, but, rather, for both public and private forces to facilitate the development of change in how the poor view and consume food.

“Food deserts,” areas characterized by relatively poor access to healthy and affordable food, may contribute to social disparities in diet and diet-related health outcomes, such as cardiovascular disease and obesity (Beaulac, Kristjansson, Cummins, 2009). The term “food desert” reportedly originated in Scotland in the early 1990s and was used to describe poor access to an affordable and healthy diet (Beaulac, Kristjansson, Cummins, 2009). Although the term “food desert” can mean a literal absence of retail food in a defined area, studies of food deserts more commonly assess differential accessibility to healthy and affordable food between socioeconomically advantaged and disadvantaged areas. (Beaulac, Kristjansson, Cummins, 2009). In other words, food deserts can simultaneously be “food swamps,” areas consisting in a saturation of access to unhealthy food (e.g., fast-food, convenience stores) and nonfood (e.g., gas stations) venues, characterized by calorie-dense, high-sugar foods (Brown & Brewster, 2015). As such, people living in these areas are at a clear disadvantage to how they obtain food.

One of the most troubling issues that is concerning our country is the amount of people living with type 2 diabetes and obesity because of food deserts. Food deserts are affecting the lives of older generation and could follow into the next generation if nothing is done to eliminate the harmful consequences of food deserts in the United States. A complete wipe out of food deserts will not be an easy process, it will years to change the eating habits for lower-income communities. It is less of a challenge to just put a supermarket in a community that needs it, but changing poor nutrition is not as easy. To dispose of food deserts, there are several ways to take action within rural communities. Since fresh fruits and vegetables are troublesome

Consumers have become increasingly detached from their food as America’s food system grows larger and continues to ruin the environment. The main problem is that most consumers do not know how their consumption habits affect the ecosystem around them. Nor do they know about how their food was produced. Information about how and where the food is being produced and wasted is essential, so people can shop responsibly. Short of legislation, Americans make choices at the grocery store. It is essential for all Americans to cast in a vote with their dollars to change the way that food is produced in the United States resulting in more sustainable food being more accessible in the aisles of the grocery store for all Americans.

Poverty is an issue that can be discussed at great lengths, but the real challenge is finding effective ways to reduce or eradicate poverty. It is important to spend quality time developing approaches to the issue of poverty and how to alleviate it. Individuals living in poverty lead a life of limited opportunities and one of these limited opportunities is access to good quality healthy food. The American Nutrition Association considers this lack of access as a Food Desert defined as, “parts of the country vapid of fresh fruit, vegetables, and other healthful whole foods, usually found in impoverished areas” ("USDA Defines Food Deserts | American Nutrition Association," n.d.). One way in which American’s can work towards a future with less poverty and eventually one with little to no poverty would be to eliminate the existence of Food Deserts.

In addition, there are many cities within the United States that are labeled as food deserts, such as Baltimore, Chicago, South Dallas, and other areas identified on the map (appendix A). Living in food deserts causes a negative impact on the city locals’ lives, as they are more likely to die earlier or develop health conditions due to the lack of healthy food. This new solution is for those people, who live unhealthy lives because they are living in a food desert. The audience for this capstone is both city officials as well as non-profit organizations, as both could pick up the project and implement this solution in food

Can you imagine not being able to access good quality, fresh food? That’s the struggle that the residents of Homewood, Pennsylvania, face every day. Homewood is a food desert, which is defined by google as “an urban area in which it is difficult to buy affordable or good-quality fresh food.” For our last project in my Urban Research and Design class this year, my teacher challenged us to turn our newfound knowledge into action, and attempt to apply what we’d learned to a real community problem.

It is often said that knowledge or education is power. And indeed on the topic of food desert in America, knowledge or education plays a critical role, both for the scholars and the policies makers and all citizens especially the ones living in these areas. There is no better way to start analyzing the problem of food desert, its cause, its consequences on communities and its potential solutions without considering the critical role that education or knowledge has in this matter. We have to approach this problem with humility and “educate resident in these communities of the impact that the topic has on them as individuals...educate them to the quality of locally grown, seasonal, and organic food” (Guthman, 2008). The essence of Guthman's

An example of a food desert is Chicago, Illinois. One out of every four children lives in poverty and many households are isolated in low income areas with lack of available transportation and a climate that contributes to the creation of food deserts. In Chicago, over the course of 40 years, there was a huge disinvestment in grocery stores in the south side of the city and even in areas that did have access to grocery stores, many did not have access to healthy, fresh foods. In fact, one study was conducted that found that when asking local children what color a banana was based on what they had witnessed in local stores, the most common response was “brown” (Walker).

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Around the table my family greets me with kind smiles. The warm steam envelops me into a sickling appetizing craving for every plate. Golden brown baked macaroni, pumpkin pie oozing out butter and a limitless supply of sweet rolls complemented with diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease. What’s not to love?

“Dietary patterns of Americans differ widely, but most Americans eat a diet that could best be described as in need of improvement”. Compared to other countries, the American diet is very different. I have first hand experienced how much different Americans eat from other countries. For a brief, but very beneficial and productive time, I lived in Barcelona, Spain with my host family. Over in Spain, they eat much more fresh, organic food. There was a lot more seafood in the average diet. The meal configuration over there is also different than ours. Lunch is the largest meal eaten every day; different than America, where dinner is the largest.

This article is completely relevant to our current geography, living in Midwest means we are surrounded by flat land, perfect for farming. Many people that live in Illinois often make fun of the fact that farmland is all we have around us; no mountains, no volcanos, just corn. This article made me realize how truly important the conservation of the Midwest is for the production of the abundance of food we consume as Americans. Almost every food we consume can be traced back to the production of a single plant, corn. Many years ago farmers were producing an abundant amount causing the price of corn to plummet. This soon changed after farmers began processing. If human interaction causes corn to be scarce then it will have an unraveling effect

Food deserts continual existence comes from the fact that nobody really has an awareness of its existence. Speaking from my own experience, I did not know anything about food deserts or what a food desert was until I started doing research. The government must fix this difficult situation and steps have been taken already, “in 2010 U.S. Pres. Barrack Obama has proposed the Healthy Food Financing Initiative (HFFI), which encouraged retailers to bring healthy foods to impoverished urban and rural communities” . However, with the government dealing with many other problems, the food desert problem doesn’t seem to be a main priority at the current moment for them. Consequently, this puts us in a position where we have to step up. People need to become more aware of this situation and how it greatly affects the people living in these communities in a very unhealthy way, “food desert resides thus face both geography and selection limitation, which could push consumers toward less healthy fare” .

Consolidation: any industry consolidates when one of the steps in the commodity chain becomes controlled by a finite number of producers. In the beef industry consolidation would be at the slaughterhouse and meat packing level. One company would consolidate the steps of production into one facility. Also companies would consolidate the market by only having a small amount of corporations controlling the slaughterhouses and meat packing. Currently, four companies control 87% of the meat production.