More than 2 million Georgians live in parts of the state where it is difficult to access fresh, healthy food, according to federal studies.
Food deserts — areas that don’t have easy access to fresh, healthy and affordable food — can be found across the state, from rural parts of southwest Georgia to urban areas such as Fulton County. And not having access to healthy food can lead to various health issues, experts said.
A state Senate panel is studying the impact that low access to healthy food has on Georgians, and it plans to recommend to the Legislature how it can make that access easier.
“We are so interested in food insecurity because it overlaps with many of our population health and community benefit priorities,” Katie Mooney, senior manager of community benefit and population health at Grady Health System, told lawmakers Tuesday. “Diabetes and hypertension are directly impacted by food access and nutrition.”
About 22% of the state’s 10.7 million residents live in urban parts of the state that are more than 1 mile from a grocery store or more than 10 miles away from a grocery store in rural areas, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service. Georgia has the fifth-highest rate of residents who live in low-income neighborhoods with low access to healthy food.
Various groups from across the state and the country shared the work each is doing to help get fresh food choices to more people. What’s missing, said Kwabena Nkromo, founder of the Atlanta Food and Farm Public Benefit Corp., is collaboration among those who are already working on ending food insecurity.
“A lot of the solutions that this study committee may be searching to find or maybe create themselves, they already exist,” said Nkromo, who is also the chairman of the Georgia Food Policy Council. “What isn’t present is a coordinated statewide structure and support and understanding of vision. There isn’t a big picture. So everybody’s kind of scrambling and doing things in silos.”
The Georgia Food Policy Council was created with federal grant money in 2010 by the state Department of Public Health to study food and nutrition concerns at the state level. The council conducted research and formed a strategic plan, but it was not funded to continue its work.
That is something state Sen. Harold Jones, an Augusta Democrat who is chairman of the study committee, said he hopes lawmakers can address.
“That’s a way to coordinate all the different types of entities that deal with this particular area,” Jones said. “It’s been in existence and is there, but I’m just not sure if it’s being properly used.”
Senators heard from people such as Nkromo, whose organization has partnered with Atlanta schools and neighborhoods to plant community gardens. Will Sellers, the executive director of Wholesome Wave Georgia, a group that works to improve access to healthy food, told lawmakers about a federal program that allows people who use food stamps at participating farmers markets and farm stands to double the value — meaning someone can spend $10 in food stamps and receive $20 worth of food.
New York City officials used incentives, such as waiving building taxes and decreasing the required number of parking spaces, to lure grocers to neighborhoods with low public transit access and few options for fresh food, said Brian Elbel, a professor of population health and health policy at New York University.
Jones said the panel, which held meetings earlier this year in Augusta and Valdosta, will make recommendations to the state Senate later this year.
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