Food Insecurity and Poverty in Sub-Sahara African Immigrant Population in Tarragona Province, Spain^{i}

Egbe M. Egbe^1,

¹Department of Anthropology, Philosophy and Social Work, Medical Anthropology Research Center, Universitat Rovira i Virgili

Cite this paper:
Egbe M. Egbe. Food Insecurity and Poverty in Sub-Sahara African Immigrant Population in Tarragona Province, Spain^{i}. Journal of Food Security. 2015; 3(5):115-124. doi: 10.12691/jfs-3-5-1

Abstract

According to a 2012 IMO report 49.3% African immigrants in Spain were without jobs in 2011, household poverty rates in the immigrant population (31%) was 12 times more than that of the autochthon population. Despite efforts to generate enough income to secure the most modest of living standards for their families or for themselves, Sub-Sahara African (SSA) immigrants in Tarragona Province are faced with precarious economic conditions and difficulties in obtaining and controlling resources. SSA immigrants demonstrate a stream of actual or contemplated causal interventions to alleviate and/or overcome the effects of these precarious conditions and provide food for themselves and their families. Adopting a framework of human agency, this article engages the ethnography of everyday life of SSAs in the context of food insecurity. Emphasis is placed on praxis (i.e. the action itself), on the tactics and strategies employed by SSA immigrants to manage and transform constraining situations that enable the very ‘habitus’ of the group.

Keywords:
agency coping strategies food insecurity immigrants economic crisis poverty

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

References:

[1]	Delormier, T., Frohlich, K. L., and Potvin, L., “Food and eating as social practice--understanding eating patterns as social phenomena and implications for public health.,” Sociology of Health & Illness, vol. 31, no. 2, p. 215-28, 2009.
[2]	Giddens A., The Constitution of Society., Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
[3]	Sewell Jr. W. H., “A theory of structure: duality, agency, and transformation,” American Journal of Sociology, vol. 98, no. 1, pp. 1-29, 1992.
[4]	Giddens A., “Some new rules of sociological method,” in Contemporary sociological theory, C. C. e. al., Ed., Malden, Blackwell publishing, 2007, pp. xii, 489.
[5]	Ellen Messer-Davidow., “Acting otherwise,” in Provoking agents: gender and agency in theory and practice, J. K. Gardiner, Ed., University of illinois Press, 1995, pp. 23-51.
[6]	Ahearn L. M., “Language and agency,” Annual Review of Anthropology, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 109-137, 2001.
[7]	Ortner S. B., “Power and Projects: Reflections on Agency,” in Anthropology and social theory: culture, power and the acting subject, Durham, Duke university Press, 2006, p. 129-159.
[8]	Kockelman P., “Agency: The Relation between Meaning, Power, and Knowledge,” Current Anthropology, vol. 48, no. 3, pp. 375-401, June 2007.
[9]	Duranti A., “Agency in Language,” in A Companion to Linguistic Anthropology, A. Duranti, Ed., MA & Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2004, pp. 449-473.
[10]	Carrasco-Garrido, P., De Miguel, A. G., Barrera, V. H., and Jiménez-García, R., “Health profiles, lifestyles and use of health resources by the immigrant population resident in Spain,” European Journal of Public Health, vol. 17, no. 5, p. 503-507, 2007.
[11]	Acevedo P., Las mujeres inmigrantes del Magreb y América Latina en la Comunidad de Madrid: características sociales y sanitarias, Madrid: Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 2004.
[12]	Instituto Nacional de Estadística, “Explotación Estadística del Padrón Municipal,” INE, Madrid, 2015.
[13]	Carmen Delia, D. Q., and Beatriz González, L. V., “Crisis económica y salud,” Gac Sanit, vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 261-265, 2009.
[14]	Instituto Nacional de Estadística, “Encuesta de población activa (EPA): Tasa de parados. 4º T 2013,” INE, Madrid, 2014.
[15]	European Commission, “How does Spain compare?,” OECD Employment Outlook, July 2013.
[16]	European Commission, “Long-term unemployment by sex, annual average,” Eurostat, 2015.
[17]	European Commission, “Unemployment rate by sex and age groups, annual average,” Eurostat, 2015.
[18]	European Commission, “At risk of poverty thresholds,” Eurostat, 2014.
[19]	Instituto Nacional de Estadística, “Living conditions survey, 2014 data,” INE, 2014.
[20]	R. a. A. J. Muñoz de Bustillo, “From rags to riches? Immigration and poverty in Spain,” MPRA, 2009.
[21]	Colectivo IOÉ, “Impactos de la crisis sobre la población inmigrante en España,” IMO, Madrid, 2012.
[22]	Martín Cerdeño V.J., “Treinta claves del mercado alimentario: pasado, presente y future,” Distribución y Consumo, 2014.
[23]	Tarasuk V. S., “Household food insecurity with hunger is associated with women’s food intakes, health and household circumstances,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 131, no. 10, p. 2670-2676, Oct. 2001.
[24]	Gracia-Arnaiz M., “Faim dans le monde,” in Dictionnaire des cultures alimentaires, J. Poulain, Ed., Presses Universitaires de France, 2012, pp. 541-555.
[25]	Rose D., “Economic Determinants and Dietary Consequences of Food Insecurity in the United States,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 129, no. 2, pp. 517S-520S, Feb. 1999.
[26]	Tarasuk V. S., and Beaton G. H., “Women’s dietary intakes in the context of household food insecurity,” The Journal of Nutrition, ., vol. 129, no. 3, pp. 672-679, March 1999.
[27]	Dixon L. B., “Differences in Energy, Nutrient, and Food Intakes in a US Sample of Mexican-American Women and Men: Findings from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1988-1994,” American Journal of Epidemiology, vol. 152, no. 6, pp. 548-557, 2000.
[28]	Lee, J. S. and Frongillo, E. A. J., “Nutritional and health consequences are associated with food insecurity among U.S. elderly persons,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 131, no. 5, p. 1503-1509, 2001.
[29]	Zizza, C. A., Duffy, P. A. and Gerrior, S. A., “Food insecurity is not associated with lower energy intakes,” Obesity, vol. 16, no. 8, p. 1908-1913, Aug. 2008.
[30]	Melgar-Quinonez, H. R., Zubieta, A. C., MkNelly, B., Nteziyaremye, A., Gerardo, M. F. D. and Dunford, C., “Household Food Insecurity and Food Expenditure in Bolivia, Burkina Faso, and the Philippines,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 136, no. 5, p. 1431-1437, 2006.
[31]	Hadley, C., Mulder, M. B. and Fitzherbert, E., “Seasonal food insecurity and perceived social support in rural Tanzania,” Public Health Nutrition, vol. 10, no. 6, p. 544-551, 2007.
[32]	Knueppel, D., Demment, M. and Kaiser, L., “Validation of the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale in rural Tanzania,” Public Health Nutrition, vol. 13, no. 3, p. 360-367, 2010.
[33]	Davies S., Adaptable livelihoods: coping with food insecurity in the Malian Sahel, New York: Macmillan Press, 1996, pp. , Macmillan Press, New York, 1996..
[34]	Nelson, D. and Finan, T., “Praying for drought: persistent vulnerability and the politics of patronage in Ceara, northeast Brazi,” American Anthropologist, vol. 111, no. 3, p. 302–316, 2009.
[35]	Vásquez-León M., “Hispanic farmers and farmworkers: social networks, institutional exclusion, and climate vulnerability in southeastern Arizona,” American Anthropologist, vol. 111, no. 3, p. 289-301, Sept 2009.
[36]	Radimer, K.L., Olson, C.M., Greene, J. C., Campbell, C.C. and Habicht, J-P., “Understanding hunger and developing indicators to assess it in women and children,” Journal of Nutrition Education, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 36S-45S, 1992.
[37]	Radimer, K. L., Olson, C. M. and Campbell, C. C., “Development of Indicators to Assess Hunger,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 120, no. (11 supplement), p. 1544-1548, 1990.
[38]	Coleman Jensen, A., Nord, M., Andrews, M. and Carlson, S., “Household food security in the United States,” Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Washington DC, 2011.
[39]	Corbett J., “Famine and household coping strategies,” World Development, vol. 16, no. 9, pp. 1099-1112, 1988..
[40]	Kerr R., “Informal labor and social relations in northern Malawi: the theoretical challenges and implications of ganyu labor for food security,” Rural Sociology, vol. 70, no. 2, p. 167-187, 2005.
[41]	V. Moreiras, J. Torres, C. Vives, S. Pozo de la Calle and E. &. T. Moreno, “Evaluación de patrones de consumo alimentario y factores relacionados en grupos de población emergentes: INMIGRANTES,” Ministerio de Medio Ambiente y Medio Rural y Marino, Madrid, 2009.
[42]	R. O. Sanchez-Mejia, J. W. Newman, S. Toh, G.-Q. Yu, Y. Zhou, B. Halabisky, M. Cisse, K. Scearce-Levie, I. H. Cheng, L. Gan, J. J. Palop, J. V. Bonventre and L. and Mucke, “Phospholipase A2 reduction ameliorates cognitive deficits in a mouse model of Alzheimer's disease,” Nature Neuroscience, vol. 11, no. 11, pp. 1311-1318, 2008.
[43]	Douglas M., Food in the Social Order: Studies of Food and Festivities in Three American Communities, New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1984.
[44]	Mennell, S., Murcott, A. and Van, Otterloo A., The Sociology of Food: Eating, Diet and Culture, London: Sage, 1993.
[45]	Murcott A., “Social influences on food choice and dietary change: a sociological attitude,” Proceedings of the Nutrition Society, vol. 54, no. 3, pp. 729-735, 1995.
[46]	T. V. a. B. GH., “Women dietary intakes in the context of household food insecurity,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 129, no. 3, pp. 672-679, 1999.
[47]	R. D. a. O. V., “Nutrient intakes of individuals from food-insufficient households in the United States.,” American Journal of Public Health, vol. 87, no. 12, pp. 1856-1861, 1997.
[48]	O. C. a. F. E. Kendall A, “Relationship of hunger and food insecurity to food availability and consumption,” Journal of the American Dietetic association, vol. 96, no. 10, pp. 1019-1024, 1996.
[49]	a. B. P. Cristofar SP., “Dietary intakes and selected characteristics of women ages 19-50 years and their children ages 1–5 years by reported perception of food sufficiency.,” Journal of Nutrition Education, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 53-58, 1992.
[50]	W. M. a. R. K. Dixon LB., “Dietary intakes and serum nutrients between adults from food-insufficient and food-sufficient families: Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1988-1994.,” The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 131, no. 4, pp. 1232-1246, 2001.
[51]	D. P. a. G. S. Zizza CA., “Food insecurity Is not associated with lower energy intakes,” Obesity, vol. 16, no. 8, pp. 1908-1913, 2008.
[52]	European Commission, “Long-term unemployment by sex, annual average,” Eurostat, 2015.
[53]	A. Azcona, “Ingestas recomendadas de energía y nutrientes,” in Nutrición y dietética, M. a. G. M. García‐Arias, Ed., Universidad de León, 2003, pp. 27-44.