An Analysis of the Prevalence and Factors Influencing Food Insecurity among University Students Participating in Alcohol Consumption in KwaZulu-Natal Province

Abstract

Food insecurity among the student population is a prominent issue in South African university institutions. However, personal experiences and the myriad of underlying factors contributing to the issue remain poorly documented. Among other factors, these universities are characterized by the admission of a majority of their student population from poor backgrounds with limited financial capabilities, and this affects their food security status. The purpose of this study was to view the patterns of food insecurity among students, with a focus on alcohol consumption as one of the various factors influencing student food security status. Data were collected from 156 student respondents from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban University of Technology, Mangosuthu University of Technology, and the University of Zululand. The Household Food Insecurity Access Scale revealed that from the total sample, only 21.79% reported themselves as food secure, whilst the remainder reported varying levels of food insecurity with 17.31% of students being food insecure, 16.03% mildly food insecure, and 44.87% severely food insecure. On the other hand, a prevalence of 73.08% (n = 114) of alcohol consumption was found among the sampled students. Ordered probit models results suggested that students’ alcohol consumption prevalence was determined by gender, level of study, exercise/playing sport, marital status, and distance to campus, which all had statistically significant effects on students’ alcohol consumption. Most crucially, gender, institution and campus positively affected students’ food security status, while the income variable made a negative significant contribution towards student food security status. Therefore, a link between students’ finances and food insecurity was evident. However, further research is required to delve into the link between the level and impact of students’ alcohol consumption and its implications on their financial status, and thus food security status. This is crucial information which will help policymakers understand these underlying factors and experiences and thus find solutions for issues related with food insecurity.

Even hungrier for knowledge: A 10-year follow-up study on vulnerability to food insecurity amongst students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal

“…The researchers found a prevalence of 60% of food insecurity amongst this subset of the student population. In contrast, research conducted at the University of the Free State (UFS) (Van den Berg & Raubenheimer, 2015), Wits (Rudolph et al, 2018;Wagner et al, 2021), UKZN (Sabi et al, 2020), and three other universities in KwaZulu-Natal (Jilajila et al, 2023), all with samples drawn from the general student population, reports food insecurity levels as 60%, 7%, 23%, 53%, and 78%, respectively. Comparisons across the latter six studies are difficult for two main reasons.…”

“…Since the abovementioned two 2013 publications, there have been at least ten additional empirical and conceptual publications in peer-reviewed sources specifically pertaining to food insecurity amongst South African university students (Dominguez-Whitehead, 2015;Dominguez-Whitehead, 2017a;Dominguez-Whitehead, 2017b;Dominguez-Whitehead & Whitehead, 2014;Jilajila et al, 2023;Rudolph et al, 2018;Sabi et al, 2020;Steenkamp et al, 2016;Van den Berg & Raubenheimer, 2015;Wagner, Kaneli & Masango, 2021). The growing focus on food insecurity amongst university students signals an important national concern with the wide variety of psychosocial problems that compromise students' academic success.…”

“…In terms of the second reason why comparisons across studies are made difficult (i.e. differing instruments), Sabi et al (2020), Jilajila et al, (2023), Wagner et al, (2021), and Rudolph et al (2018) made use of adapted versions of the HFIAS (similar to studies reported in the original 2013 and current study), while Steenkamp et al (2016) used five questions developed from the Household Hunger Scale (HHS), which is a six-item scale developed from the HFIAS with reportedly better cross-cultural applicability (Ballard et al, 2011). Although Sabi et al (2020) made use of questions adapted from the HFIAS, they report on vulnerability to food insecurity (i.e.…”