Measuring household food security: the global experience

Abstract

Measuring household food insecurity represents a challenge due to the complexity and wide array of factors associated with this phenomenon. For over one decade, researchers and agencies throughout the world have been using and assessing the validity of variations of the United States Department of Agriculture Household Food Security Supplemental Module. Thanks to numerous studies of diverse design, size, and purpose, the Household Food Security Supplemental Module has shown its suitability to directly evaluate the perceptions of individuals on their food security status. In addition, challenges and limitations are becoming clearer and new research questions are emerging as the process advances. The purpose of this article is to describe the development, validation procedures, and use of the Household Food Security Supplemental Module in very diverse settings. The most common Household Food Security Supplemental Module related studies have been conducted using criterion validity, Rasch modeling and Cronbach-Alpha Coefficient. It is critical that researchers, policy makers, governmental and non-governmental agencies intensify their efforts to further develop tools that provide valid and reliable measures of food security in diverse population groups. Additional work is needed to synthesize a universally applicable tool able to capture the global human phenomenon of food insecurity.

Insegurança alimentar no Brasil segundo diferentes cenários sociodemográficos

“…A insegurança alimentar é reconhecida como um fenômeno complexo e multidimensional de determinação multicausal 36,50,51 . Nesse sentido, os fatores que determinam a situação alimentar de uma população apresentam naturezas distintas, entre as quais a econômica, a psicossocial, a ética, a política e a cultural 52 .…”

Validity and reliability of the Arabic version of the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale in rural Lebanon

“…In many countries of this region, the scarcity of such interventions and policies is attributed in part to the lack of culture-specific tools to assess food insecurity (9) . Recent evidence highlights promising potentials in food access measurements, particularly with the development of simple household survey tools such as the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) (10)(11)(12) , a nine-item measure of food access designed to be used cross-culturally.…”

Household food insecurity and hunger among households in Sidama district, southern Ethiopia

“…Other at-risk subpopulation groups -composed of those who are unemployed, underemployed, physically and mentally disabled, and older -are on the margins for inadequate nutrition (9) . In addition to affecting dietary intake, food insecurity and hunger ultimately impact nutritional status and physical and mental well-being (10)(11)(12) . In Ethiopia, chronic and transitory (seasonal) food insecurity are severe.…”