Almost 17 million U.S. families faced food shortage

Almost 17 million U.S. families had trouble putting enough food on the table at some point in 2009, says a report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. USDA "found that 5.6 million of these households had problems throughout the year that severely disrupted normal eating patterns," Kimberly Kindy of The Washington Post reports. "Between 500,000 and 1 million of the people affected in the homes were children." So-called "food insecurity" was lower in rural areas, where 8.9 percent reported low food security in 2009 compared to 10.5 percent in principal cities.

"The number of 'food insecure' homes remained about the same as in 2008," Kindy writes. "But it has more than tripled since 2006 as the recession set in and nearly 10 percent of households were hit by unemployment." The report also examined state-by-state food insecurity levels from 2007-09. "Estimated prevalence rates of food insecurity during this 3-year period ranged from 6.7 percent in North Dakota to 17.7 percent in Arkansas," USDA writes, while "estimated prevalence rates of very low food security ranged from 2.6 percent in North Dakota to 6.8 percent in Alabama." (Read more)