Megan Blake

Locate GeoFoodie Find GeoFoodie at The University of Sheffield Living with that oxymoron of being a Dyslexic-Academic and getting help with it. As an academic, it can be difficult declaring and getting support for a specific learning disability

We are seeing strong correlations between weight and income among adults and children, but also there are mental health related issues linked to feelings of isolati The dual impact of poverty premiums and rural premiums makes access to food more expensive because of transport costs. Welfare reform, austerity and Universal Credit are a toxic combination making life more difficult for people Central government has devolved support to local authorities and charities while at the same time withdrawing resources, which is producing an uneven social support network. Thus an income of £13K in an inner city neighbourhood where there is an adequate supply of public housing, convenient shops offering high quality food, and an abundance of support services will create an experience that is much easier to live with, compared to the situation of living in aperi-urban housing estate where there are no shops and where transport costs are high and services are few. National level data collection concerning everyday food insecurity, charity provision, and food access is inadequate, and although there have been efforts to introduce some of thesemeasures they are being resisted by central government (15)It is very difficult to know what proportion of the population is living in food insecurity and the UK does not have a government measure of household food insecurity.

One in every five people in the UK today are living in poverty – that is, living with a household income below 60% of the median national income when housing costs are considered. The study defines a food desert as the presence of two or fewer VAT-registered food shops in areas based on population concentrations of between 5,000 to 15,000 people. The important thing to understand about this research is that it identifies areas where there are likely to be high concentrations of people on low income who will have the added burden of having to travel further than others to access food. While the causes of loneliness vary depending on the circumstances of individuals, it is also clear that being unable to afford or access food also means that people forgo social interactions.

The important thing to understand about this research is that it identifies areas where there are likely to be high concentrations of low income people who will have the added burden of having to travel further than others to access food. As a result it cannot rely on survey data, although the report does provide some very good discussion of survey data concerning people’s perceptions of cost and affordability. What this means is that very urban areas with high concentrations of people will be geographically small, while more rural areas will be larger in order to capture the number of people who define an area. What the map shows, and this is important so I will repeat it, is that there are some areas of the country where there are large concentrations of people who are more likely to struggle to access food.