Unit 8 Assignment college comp 2
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Unit 8 Assignment
Alice Ackerson
University of Purdue Global
CM220
Professor Haber
October 17,2023
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One of the most important issues facing the globe today is food scarcity. It's well known that
there is a sufficient food for everyone on the planet nevertheless; due to the unprecedented and
swift changes in the global economy, food is becoming scarcer and more elusive. For families to
create their communities for everyone to have enough to eat, food scarcity is crucial. Without it,
people cannot construct their communities. Strafford Landing Community Association, Fairfax
County Board of Supervisors, and Fairfax County Public Schools should address the issue of
food scarcity because addressing it will decrease the number of residents affected in Alexandria
VA, increase access to fresh produce to lower income communities, and develop nutritional
educational programs to local schools in affected areas.
When thinking of food and having limited access one response that could be made is reaching out
for help. There is a charity group called Arcadia that assists residents of Richmond Highway,
Virginia, in getting access to reasonably priced foods. However, many residents are scared or
embarrassed to reach out to places like Arcadia. This is because residents on Richmond Highway
are experiencing access limitations to food. For example, Mikey lives on Richmond Highway and
works 9-5 every day. Since he never went to college due to circumstances, he had ended up
instead working at McDonalds. As Mikey worked and received his paycheck, each paycheck went
towards the bills. This would vary from electric, gas and house bills leaving Mikey with some
money for food. Another problem Mikey was running into was Covid. With Covid and going into
lockdown companies paused too. This left Mikey struggling even more with paying his bills but
even more importantly food. The report “Route One Lived Experiences” from Arcadia includes
the effects of food scarcity as well as what Covid-19 has placed on top of those affected in
Alexandria Virginia. Despite Fairfax being one of the wealthiest counties data indicated that
since 2019 over 55,000 residents have suffered during covid from having limited access and
providing food to support them and their kids (Arcadia,2021 April 30). Therefore, with Arcadia
launching the Richmond Highway Food Insecurity Project this has helped residents in Fairfax
County Virginia with opening more opportunities to accessing food locally. One program Arcadia
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provided to Richmond Highway was the L.E.G Garden. The L.E.G Garden was a network that
engaged community members to learn while shadowing a team member associated with Arcadia
to plant fruits and vegetables at no cost.
In addition, all 12 months we are constantly changing seasons, but have you ever noticed that
being sick can change daily activities too? When it comes to being sick nobody likes being stuck
in bed. As being sick calls for a day off this doesn’t necessarily mean that it wouldn’t come with a
price. For instance, when a kid does in fact becomes sick usually a spouse or guardian is at home
taking care of the kid.
As a result of staying home that spouse or guardian must call off work.
This then leads to not only ensuring the kids health but can also impact the guardian too. If the
parent becomes sick as well this adds additional absences to work without sick pay. SNAP is a
program that is on a federal level meaning that each month money is funded for people to buy
food to survive. SNAP also tries to help people from poverty and prevent individuals from falling
back into poverty. The reason for this movement was because Fairfax County Public Schools
were providing meals to students who were on free or reduced lunch and lost access to meals.
This also added limits to the parent as they had responsibilities to withhold leaving the parent to
alleviate the problem. One argument that can impact programs like SNAP was Nutritional
Security. Nutritional Security help communities choose what lower income communities should
and shouldn’t eat, but as a result is that this choice has led to a higher risk of food scarcity.
According to the article “SNAP”, it explains why food scarcity is impacting communities and the
challenges that would pose as a threat in the lower income areas. With nutritional restrictions
Gundersen said that this would leave many unattended and limit the options that SNAP does
offer. Therefore, allowing SNAP to proceed with what they are doing would have a positive
outcome regarding those affected (Gundersen,2022 August 18).
Lastly, it’s important to see the benefits of what buying from a local farmers market can do as
well as educating others on how this can help with food scarcity. Fairfax County needs to
assemble local markets and develop nutritional programs to local schools. Resources like Fairfax
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Counties Government Center provides issues within Fairfax County and can be accessed on a
device or at the center. According to the Departments of Community and Human Services to
increase the knowledge about food insecurity Feeding America has been conducting an annual
study called Map the Meal Gap since 2011. Map the Meal has four forms of local level data. This
data includes elimination of overall and child food scarcity, average meal expenses and food
budget gaps (U.S Department of Health ,2023).Based on the latest statistics from Map the Meal,
Alexandria has an 8.4 percent rate of food insecurity (Feeding America,2021).Seeing this rate the
city of Alexandria employed a Food Scarcity Coordinator in 2022 to assess the level of food
scarcity enhancing the numerous initiatives to alleviate food poverty among the Alexandrians. A
range of Alexandria’s stakeholders were brought together by the Food Security coordinator to
form the Alexandria Food Security Work Group. In addition, the Department of Health, parks,
recreations, City of Alexandria Public Schools, and nonprofit organizations were the important
stakeholders in this situation. It’s important to be involved with local communities like Fairfax
County because there are ways to help its just about determination and consistency. As plans
come about its clear that food scarcity is real, and it needs to be addressed.
Next time when out buying food and don’t have enough money to get the item chosen, think
about how money means accessing to obtaining that item. Money is the main source that keeps
our economy running as well as helping provide daily essentials. Without money our
communities wouldn’t be able to purchase food. Like Capital One’s commercial always says
“What’s in Your Wallet”.
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References:
Arcadia. (2021, April 30).
Route 1 lived experiences report
. Arcadia.
http://www.arcadiafood.org/RT1Report
Feeding America. (2021).
Overall (all ages) hunger & poverty in Virginia: Map the meal gap
.
Overall (all ages) Hunger & Poverty in the United States.
https://map.feedingamerica.org/county/2021/overall/virginia
Gundersen, C. (2022, August 18). SNAP: The Most Important Component of Our Efforts to End
Food Insecurity in the United States.
https://eds-s-ebscohost-com.libauth.purdueglobal.edu/eds/detail/detail?vid=10&sid=cece6c76-
fed2-48af-bf52 491c9afdce67%40redis&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU
%3D#AN=35981279&db=mdl
U.S Department of Health and Human Services. (2023).
Food insecurity
. Food Insecurity –
Healthy People 2030.
https://health.gov/healthypeople/priority-areas/social-determinants-health/literature-
summaries/food-insecurity#:~:text=Food%20insecurity%20is%20defined%20as,uncertain
%20access%20to%20adequate%20food.&text=In%202020%2C%2013.8%20million
%20households,some%20time%20during%20the%20year.&text=Food%20insecurity%20does
%20not%20necessarily,possible%20outcome%20of%20food%20insecurity