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News & ArtsThursday, March 14, 2013
Health / Chow Speaking of Food Deserts
Posted by Anna Minard on Thu, Mar 14, 2013 at 2:22 PM
- USDA
- SEATTLE! Here are your food deserts.
Expanding the availability of nutritious and affordable food by developing and equipping grocery stores, small retailers, corner markets and farmers’ markets in communities with limited access is an important part of the First Lady's Let's Move! initiative.
There are many ways to define which areas are considered "food deserts" and many ways to measure food store access for individuals and for neighborhoods. Most measures and definitions take into account at least some of the following indicators of access:
• Accessibility to sources of healthy food, as measured by distance to a store or by the number of stores in an area.
• Individual-level resources that may affect accessibility, such as family income or vehicle availability.
• Neighborhood-level indicators of resources, such as the average income of the neighborhood and the availability of public transportation.
Up there to the right is what it looks like if you zoom in on Seattle. Food deserts are colored green. You can go zoom around the map yourself right here.
1
I am not a food desert denier, but I must not understand the methodology or the tool well enough, because I looked at the green tract near my house, and I know for a fact that there has been a grocery store in part of it since before 2010. It's near the edge of the section, so it may have to do with the census tract layout or something...
2
Guess you didn't hear, food deserts are a myth created by folks who want to remove all personal responsibility in our lives:
April 17, 2012
Studies Question the Pairing of Food Deserts and Obesity
By GINA KOLATA
It has become an article of faith among some policy makers and advocates, including Michelle Obama, that poor urban neighborhoods are food deserts, bereft of fresh fruits and vegetables.
But two new studies have found something unexpected. Such neighborhoods not only have more fast food restaurants and convenience stores than more affluent ones, but more grocery stores, supermarkets and full-service restaurants, too. And there is no relationship between the type of food being sold in a neighborhood and obesity among its children and adolescents.
Within a couple of miles of almost any urban neighborhood, “you can get basically any type of food,” said Roland Sturm of the RAND Corporation, lead author of one of the studies. “Maybe we should call it a food swamp rather than a desert,” he said.
Some experts say these new findings raise questions about the effectiveness of efforts to combat the obesity epidemic simply by improving access to healthy foods. Despite campaigns to get Americans to exercise more and eat healthier foods, obesity rates have not budged over the past decade, according to recently released federal data.
Guess you didn't hear, food deserts are a myth created by folks who want to remove all personal responsibility in our lives:
April 17, 2012
Studies Question the Pairing of Food Deserts and Obesity
By GINA KOLATA
It has become an article of faith among some policy makers and advocates, including Michelle Obama, that poor urban neighborhoods are food deserts, bereft of fresh fruits and vegetables.
But two new studies have found something unexpected. Such neighborhoods not only have more fast food restaurants and convenience stores than more affluent ones, but more grocery stores, supermarkets and full-service restaurants, too. And there is no relationship between the type of food being sold in a neighborhood and obesity among its children and adolescents.
Within a couple of miles of almost any urban neighborhood, “you can get basically any type of food,” said Roland Sturm of the RAND Corporation, lead author of one of the studies. “Maybe we should call it a food swamp rather than a desert,” he said.
Some experts say these new findings raise questions about the effectiveness of efforts to combat the obesity epidemic simply by improving access to healthy foods. Despite campaigns to get Americans to exercise more and eat healthier foods, obesity rates have not budged over the past decade, according to recently released federal data.
5
Green is so obviously the wrong map color for a 'food desert'... it should be sandy yellow, tan, or beige. #infographicFail
6
Short bus ride from all the desert to MacPhersons on the Hill. I call bullshit on this map... much of the green is industrial area....
8
Guilty white liberals striping the po' of self-will and personal responsibility.
The myth of food desert:
http://tinyurl.com/9rrc2x8
But why trust a Detroiter?
Noah Stephens:
"I've witnessed the relationship between diet and illness first hand. I've watched poor diet cripple and eventually kill the people closest to me. That's had a profound affect on my behavior as an adult.
Since I've been a grown-up, I've lived on the westside of Detroit, in the Cass Corridor, downtown, and on the east side near the historic Indian Village neighborhood. I've never been rich (I actually grew up on welfare), yet I've always managed to maintain a healthy diet, supplied mostly by stores in the city of Detroit. When I hear that healthy food is difficult or impossible to procure in Detroit, I hear a statement that contradicts my entire life experience."
From the New York Times:
Dr. Sturm [lead author of the Rand study] found no relationship between what type of food students said they ate, what they weighed, and the type of food within a mile and a half of their homes.
He has also completed a national study of middle school students, with the same result — no consistent relationship between what the students ate and the type of food nearby. Living close to supermarkets or grocers did not make students thin and living close to fast food outlets did not make them fat.
The myth of food desert:
http://tinyurl.com/9rrc2x8
But why trust a Detroiter?
Noah Stephens:
"I've witnessed the relationship between diet and illness first hand. I've watched poor diet cripple and eventually kill the people closest to me. That's had a profound affect on my behavior as an adult.
Since I've been a grown-up, I've lived on the westside of Detroit, in the Cass Corridor, downtown, and on the east side near the historic Indian Village neighborhood. I've never been rich (I actually grew up on welfare), yet I've always managed to maintain a healthy diet, supplied mostly by stores in the city of Detroit. When I hear that healthy food is difficult or impossible to procure in Detroit, I hear a statement that contradicts my entire life experience."
From the New York Times:
Dr. Sturm [lead author of the Rand study] found no relationship between what type of food students said they ate, what they weighed, and the type of food within a mile and a half of their homes.
He has also completed a national study of middle school students, with the same result — no consistent relationship between what the students ate and the type of food nearby. Living close to supermarkets or grocers did not make students thin and living close to fast food outlets did not make them fat.
9
@1 - It counts areas where a third of the tract is low income AND more than a mile from groceries. There likely are stores in many of these locales (looking at the national map), but it's the proportion of people in that area that makes it count.
@Anna - The snipped map shows low income AND low access.. which pretty much just maps 1:1 to low income most places. Try clicking Component Layers on the source map and choosing the 2nd & 3rd options (pink & teal). That shows only access without income data and makes for a much more colorful map. You'll see nearly everyone lives in a desert except those in certain parts of the city.
@Anna - The snipped map shows low income AND low access.. which pretty much just maps 1:1 to low income most places. Try clicking Component Layers on the source map and choosing the 2nd & 3rd options (pink & teal). That shows only access without income data and makes for a much more colorful map. You'll see nearly everyone lives in a desert except those in certain parts of the city.
11
@9 Oh! So now I see the grey lines that define the areas which are then shaded based on the data... That makes it make more sense now.
The shaded regions are not maps of the desert, but rather somewhat arbitrary units of space that are coded based on how much of the population in them may be under served.
Unfortunately, that makes the tool sort of useless, doesn't it?
The shaded regions are not maps of the desert, but rather somewhat arbitrary units of space that are coded based on how much of the population in them may be under served.
Unfortunately, that makes the tool sort of useless, doesn't it?
12
Well, not to pile on, but the map is in error for the Tukwila area. There is Seafood City (Philippino-Asian grocery store) in the old Mervyn's location at Southcenter Mall.
13
@12 those Asians fuck up everything with good fresh food available in low income hoods.
"Unfortunately, that makes the tool sort of useless, doesn't it?"
Well, this is politics not science. Trying to blame others for poor personal choices.
"Unfortunately, that makes the tool sort of useless, doesn't it?"
Well, this is politics not science. Trying to blame others for poor personal choices.
14
we should banish the word ghetto and use Food Desert instead. I think "mexican" is officially a slur now as well; someone get on that.
15
fucking food creationists...
From the New York Times:
Dr. Sturm [lead author of the Rand study] found no relationship between what type of food students said they ate, what they weighed, and the type of food within a mile and a half of their homes.
He has also completed a national study of middle school students, with the same result — no consistent relationship between what the students ate and the type of food nearby. Living close to supermarkets or grocers did not make students thin and living close to fast food outlets did not make them fat.
From the New York Times:
Dr. Sturm [lead author of the Rand study] found no relationship between what type of food students said they ate, what they weighed, and the type of food within a mile and a half of their homes.
He has also completed a national study of middle school students, with the same result — no consistent relationship between what the students ate and the type of food nearby. Living close to supermarkets or grocers did not make students thin and living close to fast food outlets did not make them fat.
16
White Center is FAR from a food desert. It may not have Safeway/QFC/FM/WFM etc, but there are Latino and Asian focused grocery stores aplenty. One of them is called Hung Long Market. I kid you not.
19
I haven't been down to the Kent Valley in awhile, but I find it ironic that it's included on this map of food deserts -- underneath the concrete and asphalt pavement in the industrial zones is some incredibly fertile soil. Growing up down there in the 1960s and 70s most of us spent at least part of the summer picking fruit and vegetables for local farmers.
As some of the other comments have noted, access to food isn't just a question of the number of grocery stores, but also of transportation. Whatever our future goals are for a mix of public transit and private vehicles, right now it's very difficult to live in some of those Valley communities without a car -- access to all kinds of services, including food, is a real challenge.
As some of the other comments have noted, access to food isn't just a question of the number of grocery stores, but also of transportation. Whatever our future goals are for a mix of public transit and private vehicles, right now it's very difficult to live in some of those Valley communities without a car -- access to all kinds of services, including food, is a real challenge.
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