Food Pantry Selection Solutions

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Food pantry selection solutions: a randomized controlled trial in client-choice food pantries to nudge clients to targeted foods
Food insecurity has unfortunately been persisting, despite various efforts to lessen this problem. Feeding America, which encompasses a network of food banks and pantries is responsible for providing food to 15.5 million households every year. Food insecure households are shown to be more likely to have diet-related diseases. Client-choice style food pantries have been established as a way to allow the client to choose products they are likely to use, hopefully mitigating waste. This could lead to choices that are not healthy, however. This study focused on techniques to encourage clients to choose healthier food items. Findings suggested that placing healthier dessert options (protein bars) at the beginning of the line within the food pantry increased the uptake relative to placing the bars at the end of the line. Findings also showed that food pantry users were more likely to choose a product that was left in the original packaging. This could be due to the reduced stigma of receiving product from the food pantry. Food pantry users were more unlikely to choose products that were taken outside of the original box and individually placed for clients to take. One limitation to this study is being able to nudge clients in the healthier direction when food pantries rely heavily on food donations. This means that the food pantry will have to work with what donations they are given. One benefit to these findings is that making these small changes are relatively cost-free and feasible for any food pantry organizer.

 Wilson, N. L., Just, D. R., Swigert, J., & Wansink, B. (2016). Food pantry selection           solutions: a randomized controlled trial in client-choice food pantries to     nudge clients to targeted foods. Journal of Public Health, fdw043.

KS

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  1. ksu internsOctober 1, 2017 at 4:30 PM

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  2. ksu internsOctober 1, 2017 at 4:33 PM

    This post was very interesting to read. I like the idea of client-choice style food pantries although I can understand that this might lead to poor food choices. A solution to this problem might be to get healthier options of all the foods people want so they can only make better health choices. I think these food pantries can help people to eat more because people are more likely to eat the foods they actually want and it will decrease food waste. BG

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