Edwin Brands^1,, Argie Manolis², Danny Kenyon³, Lily Sugimura⁴, Allison Koos⁵

This article reports the approach and main findings of a yearlong effort (2021-2022) to characterize food security within the context of Stevens County, MN (population 9,700), a rural county in West-Central Minnesota, USA. We used the USDA ERS Community Food Security Assessment Toolkit (with some modifications) for this assessment. In addition to collecting information about household food security, we deployed a survey for gathering information about food availability and accessibility as well as barriers to food access that residents may have been experiencing. Residents identified economic issues, mobility issues, and issues related to land access and seasonal gardening as barriers to food access. Approximately 9% of county residents’ incomes were below the federal poverty line; about 1/3 of respondents indicated at least some tendency toward experiencing food insecurity. More than half of the population lives over 1 mile (1.6 km) from the nearest grocery store, and approximately 30% of the population lives more than 2 miles (3km) from the nearest grocery store. In addition to the household survey, we also conducted a market basket survey focused on USDA Thrifty Food Plan item availability and cost at local grocery stores in spring 2022 and gathered information about local food production and availability. Based on this assessment, which also included local trends in grocery store closures and significant increases in visits to and food distributed by the local food pantry (or food shelf), county residents appear to have been experiencing food desertification: food was becoming more difficult for many county residents to access.

food security, community assessment, food desertification, rural, minnesota