Al Jazeera Report Highlights Nutrition Crisis in Navajo Nation

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One way the U.N. hopes to end hunger: encourage sustainable food production among indigenous peoples by 2030. On the Navajo Nation, some tribal citizens are already on that track. “When we raise our own sheep, we’re able to sustain ourselves,” said Aretta Begay. “We’re able to feed our own family, whether it’s big or small.” But progress in Navajo Nation, with its high poverty rates and long-standing lack of access to nutritious food, will be an uphill battle.  article in Al Jazeera America

Source: Diné Policy Institute. Map by Alex Newman/Al Jazeera America.

The problem of hunger and food insecurity in the Navajo nation has been well documented. With fewer than a dozen grocery stores to serve nearly 300,000 residents in an area about the size of South Carolina, access to nutritious food is almost non-existent.

"Gas stations and trading posts fill the vast spaces in between those stores, selling foods loaded with salt, sugar, fat and preservatives. According to the Diné Community Advocacy Alliance, a Navajo think tank, 80 percent of food sold in the Navajo Nation could be considered junk," said a report in Al Jazeera America. "One in three residents is diabetic or prediabetic, and recent studies show that heart disease is the second-leading cause of death among tribal citizens living on the reservation."

In a  recent report to Congress, eentitled “Addressing Child Hunger and Obesity in Indian Country,” researchers found that Native American children had “approximately twice the levels of food insecurity, obesity and Type 2 diabetes relative to the averages for all U.S. children of similar ages,” said Al Jazeera America.

The Navajo nation has attempted to address the problem by proposing a tax on junk food in 2014 and eliminating an existing tax on fruits and vegetables. However, making junk food more expensive only solves the problem partially. The supply side of the equation is also important. Even if fruits and vegetables are less expensive, how do you ensure that you increase availability? Some residents like Aretta Begay grow a small vegetable garden and raise churro sheep to feed their families.“We have a huge problem with having access to good, quality food,” she tells Al Jazeera America. “We don’t have access to grocery stores.”

Providing the resources for personal and community gardens would go a long way toward addressing the problem. The dilemma is common not only to the Navajo nation but to many Indian reservations are rural areas around the country.

Fortunately, the recently announced Global Goals for Sustainable Development, and in particular Goal 2 of Zero Hunger, open the door for our public officials at all levels to find creative solutions to address the problem of a lack of food access.

"The question of food access could soon be getting renewed focus," said the Al Jazeera America report. "Starting in January, the United States will be aiming to reach the United Nations’ new Sustainable Development Goals. One of the priorities is ensuring access to nutritious food. In Indian Country, achieving that goal is a long way off."

The Al Jazeera report--written by Tristan Ahtone in Red Mesa, Ariz.,and Jolene Yazzie in Lupton, Ariz., with photos by Jolene Yazzie--is very comprehensive, offering statistics, anecdotes, graphics and other valuable information. (One resident who was interviewed for the article allowed the reporters to look into their refrigerator. Check out the full article to see what was found in the fridge).

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Report Examines Impact of Proposed Food Tax on Health and Hunger in New Mexico

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Reinstating a tax on the sale of food for consumption at home could harm the health of New Mexicans who are already food insecure—meaning they don’t always have enough to eat. And while the revenue generated from a tax on food could be used to mitigate some of the damage the tax would do, the report finds that it is unlikely governments would spend the new revenue toward that end. -New Mexico Voices for Childrens report“A Health Impact Assessment of a Food Tax in New Mexico

There are many efforts underway to examine the relationship of health and nutrition to hunger. This week, the Bread for the World Institute published a comprehensive report on this issue, entitled The Nourishing Effect.  On Tuesday, we posted a piece about this report earlier this week.

The New Mexico Voices for Children also published a report on the same topic this week. The report, funded in part by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Pew Charitable Trusts, is more specific to New Mexico.  This report examines how proposals to reinstate a tax on the sale of food for consumption at home could harm the health of New Mexicans who are already food insecure. 

“When all is said and done, taxing food will hurt those New Mexicans who are already hurting the most,” said Veronica C. García, Ed.D., executive director of NM Voices. “Almost a third of our state’s children don’t get enough to eat—even with school meals, SNAP benefits and food banks. How can we, in good conscience, expect them to do with even less food?"

The report looks at three possible outcomes of a food tax: that families would maintain their current food purchasing patterns, leaving less money for other necessities such as medication and health care; that families would spend the same amount of money on food, but be able to purchase less of it (or substitute less-expensive, less-nutritious foods); and that state or local governments would collect more revenue, which could impact their spending patterns.

Health Impacts of a Food Tax on Family Economic Security: Taxing food would cost each New Mexico household around $350 per year, or $29 per month, on average. Highest-income earners in New Mexico would spend about one-half of 1 percent of their income on a food tax, while the lower half of New Mexico earners would spend around 1 percent of their income on the food tax alone—double the rate that high earners would pay. Research and calculations show that a food tax would exacerbate the tax system’s regressivity—that is it would hit low-income earners harder than it would hit high- income earners—and could harm family economic security, which could have negative impacts on mental health and stress levels, income available for other necessary purchases besides food, need and demand for public assistance, childhood development, ability to pay for health services and medicine, economic equity, and the ability to manage chronic conditions through diet.

Health Impacts of a Food Tax on Food Security, Diet, and Nutrition:Taxing food could also have an adverse impact on food security, diet, and nutrition by prompting purchases of less food or cheaper, less nutritious food. This could have important and harmful implications for health, particularly nutrition-related chronic conditions, the ability to manage chronic conditions through diet, childhood development and learning capacity, malnutrition issues, the incidence of low birth-weight and/or preterm babies, and the need and demand for food assistance from public, private, and nonprofit sources.

Health Impacts of a Food Tax on Government Spending: It is also possible that the negative health impacts of taxing food could be mitigated by how that revenue is spent. If food tax revenues lead to overall increased government spending on direct health services, food assistance and nutrition programs, programs that provide recreational opportunities, and education, then the food tax could have positive implications for health, or at the very least have no net negative implications. However, it is more likely that food tax revenue would be used to make up for decreasing revenue and so be used to maintain current service levels. Though it is possible that any increases could be spent on the programs noted above, for most program areas, it is unlikely, particularly at the municipal level.

Here are links to the executive summary and the full report

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2016 Hunger Report Looks at Relationship of Health and Hunger

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The Bread for the World Institutes 2016 Hunger Report, The Nourishing Effect, was the talk of Twitter on the day it was released on Monday, November 23. #HungerReport was the #1 Twitter trend in Washington and was the #6 trend in the nation.

Several VIPs were on hand for the release of the report at the National Press Club, including Kevin Concannon, the Undersecretary of Agriculture, and Deb Eschmeyer, who runs the Let’s Move program in First Lady Michelle Obama’s office.

Here is  an excerpt from the executive summary.

Hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition ruin health. But good nutrition is preventive medicine. Hunger leads to poor health and poor health contributes to descents into hunger and food insecurity—especially among people who must choose between paying for food or medicine. In the United States, the issues of hunger and health have been seen as two separate and distinct challenges. But that is beginning to change as the system adapts to an ambitious reform agenda driven by the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The ACA is moving the U.S. healthcare system to focus on prevention and to address the root causes of chronic diseases.

Photo: Bread for the World

The Bread for the World Institute and Bread for the World will host a Twitter conversation this (Tuesday) morning at 11:00 A.M. Eastern Time (9:00 A.M. Mountain Time).

If you have any questions or observations about the report, please share them with the hosts of the Twitter conversation: Kelvin Beachum, an anti-hunger activist who plays for the  Pittsburgh Steelers; Lisa Scales of the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank, and Asma Lateef, director of the Bread for the World Institute. If you want to participate, follow @BreadInstitute on Twitter.

Download the full report

Here are some tweets related to the release of the report.

US spends more on health care of all rich countries, yet sees poorest health outcomes. #HungerReport #health pic.twitter.com/m3DmmpUmkQ

— Bread Institute (@breadinstitute) November 23, 2015

#hungerreport: socioeconomic inequality largely responsible for #hunger in US. @bread4theworld @breadinstitute pic.twitter.com/3gTZDhFFrk

— AllianceToEndHunger (@toendhunger) November 23, 2015

TOMORROW 11 a.m EST: Twitter chat about the linkage between hunger & health. #HungerReport https://t.co/GDhlOSV1oS pic.twitter.com/5JoByam7Fh

— Bread for the World (@bread4theworld) November 24, 2015

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