When we talk about hunger in America, we refer to the ability of people to obtain sufficient food for their household.

While starvation seldom occurs in this country, children and adults do go hungry and chronic undernutrition does occur when financial resources are low. The mental and physical changes that accompany inadequate food intakes can have harmful effects on learning, development, productivity, physical and psychological health, and family life.

Food Research and
Action Center

What is Hunger?

Hunger is defined as the uneasy or painful sensation caused by lack of food.

Food insecurity refers to the lack of access to enough food to fully meet basic needs at all times due to lack of financial resources.

Hunger and malnutrition are in fact the number one risk to the health worldwide — greater than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. Recently, financial and economic crises have pushed more people into hunger. Hunger causes micronutrient deficiencies which make people susceptible to infectious diseases, impair physical and mental development, reduce their labour productivity and increase the risk of premature death.

Who is Hungry?

In Jacksonville, more than 76,000 people are hungry – they lack enough food to meet basic needs.

27,230 of them are children under the age of 18.
(Source: U.S. Census and Food Research and Action Center)

One in 6 people in Jacksonville suffer from hunger.

Why are they hungry?

The major cause of food insecurity is lack of financial resources. For many, this lack of financial resources comes on suddenly, with the loss of a job or extreme medical or personal problems.

Nationally, experts see a correlation between the unemployment rate and the number of people in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (formerly the Food Stamp Program).

December 2007 December 2008 August 2009
U.S. Unemployment Rate 4.90% 7.20% 9.70%
SNAP Participants 27,500,000 32,000,000 43,000,000*
* Estimate

In Jacksonville, the unemployment rate has gone from 4.1% in 2007 to 11.2% in July 2009.

Who’s Helping?

All of the members of the Hunger Swat Team are helping ease hunger in Jacksonville but the demand far exceeds the resources available.

Some provide hot meals – more than 4,300 a day so far in 2009. That is a 28% increase over the number of meals provided per day in 2007.

Others provide groceries that individuals or families can take home. Salvation Army alone filled 130 grocery orders each day in the first eight months of 2009. And Second Harvest North Florida supplied more than 10 million pounds of food across an 18-county region in North Florida. City Rescue Mission served over 280,000 meals last year alone.