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We hear almost daily the staggering figures about hunger in the United States. For example: “The number of Americans who don’t have enough to eat has reached 49.1 million including nearly one child in four—the highest figures since the government started keeping track in 1995.”
We also are more often using the term “food insecurity.” Food insecurity is the “availability of nutritionally adequate and safe food, or having limited or uncertain ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways.” On the other hand, hunger is defined as “the uneasy or painful sensation caused by a recurrent or involuntary lack of food and is a potential, although not necessary, consequence of food insecurity .”
The USDA reported in 2009 that 17 million households (14.6 per- cent) were food-insecure in 2008, an increase from 13 million (11.1 percent) in 2007.
For many, it’s perhaps easy to dismiss such numbers when they don’t have direct contact with people in need or haven’t experienced hunger personally. But the numbers are quite real, and we see evidence of that every day at Caritas. Overall in the US, the demand for emer- gency food assistance increased by 30 percent in 2009. Forty percent of those relying on food assistance ate less than they felt they should or cut meals because there was not enough money for food.
Texas has greater levels of these problems than do other states. Texas holds the third highest rate of food insecure households (3 million) in the US—and the seventh highest rate of hunger (5.1 percent of households). Texas also has the highest rate of children under the age of 18 who are food-insecure.
Caritas runs the largest food pantry in the Waco-McLennan County area and is on the forefront of the battle against food insecurity and hunger. Statistics may only be numbers, but we see the faces of the people who live in these conditions. We hear, each day, the testimonies of families who don’t have enough to eat.The USDA estimates 96 billion pounds of food are wasted annually in the US. Food insecurity and hunger costs Americans more than $9 billion annually. These are very troubling figures, and should move us to even greater levels of action to address food insecurity and hunger.
I appreciate the support given to Caritas from our community, and I ask that you continue to join us in increasing awareness of the problems of food insecurity and hunger that exists in our midst. If you need more information about Caritas and our ministries, please feel free to contact me.
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