Resource Library

Produced with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, this report evaluates food insecurity in New Jersey and proposes actionable recommendations to eliminate hunger across the state.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had profound impacts across food and early care and education (ECE) systems that has exacerbated inequities and racial injustices in food, health, and education. While severely devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent economic crisis, the ECE sector and food and agriculture systems are ripe with opportunity to build back with greater equity and resiliency. Farm to early care and education (farm to ECE) can be a component of building back better.

This report sheds light on the importance of the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for older adults and the positive impacts of the temporary increase in SNAP benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic. SNAP — the nation’s first defense against hunger — is vital to participants’ food security, nutrition, and health, and to the economy.

The Child Tax Credit (CTC) expansion included in the American Rescue Plan is an investment. It has bolstered efforts to address hunger and its root causes — most notably poverty — by providing a lifeline for families with children to put food on the table; pay housing expenses, debts, and child care; and supplement lost wages due to the pandemic. 

FRAC’s 2022 School Breakfast and School Lunch Report found student participation in school breakfast and lunch dropped dramatically across the country when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and school nutrition programs are still recovering.

As of January 3, seven states have been approved to distribute Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT) benefits for school-age children in the 2021–2022 school year. Of these states, only Michigan has been approved to use simplifying assumptions for the predominant models of learning as opposed to tracking student-level data. Learn more about how Michigan is calculating P-EBT benefits.

Poor nutrition, poverty, and food insecurity have detrimental impacts on infant, child, and maternal health and well-being. Connecting patients to WIC is an evidence-based strategy to address these issues. This resource provides information about WIC and the importance of referring eligible people to this critical Child Nutrition Program.

The House-passed Build Back Better (BBB) Act (H.R. 5376) would make historic investments in proven child nutrition programs. The Act would increase the number of schools that can offer meals to all students at no charge through the Community Eligibility Provision and it would create a nationwide Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) program. Combined, these provisions would help reduce hunger, improve health, and support children’s academic achievement in states across the U.S.

Native American communities remain resilient in the face of disproportionately high rates of poverty, hunger, unemployment, and poor health, both before and during COVID19. For American Indian and Alaska Native communities, disparities in food insecurity are a result of the structural racism originating with colonization and continuing to the present.

The NIH issued a Request for Information (RFI), “Research Opportunities to End Hunger, Food and Nutrition Insecurity,” to solicit feedback on innovative and multidisciplinary research avenues to address the systemic factors underlying hunger. FRAC responded to this RFI.

As part of the effort to implement Executive Order 13985, “Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government,” USDA issued a Request for Information to help them identify opportunities in current USDA policies, regulations, and guidance to address systemic inequities. FRAC submitted a comment in response to this request.

As part of the effort to implement Executive Order 13985, “Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government,” the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a Request for Information (RFI) on how agencies could internally assess the state of equity in their policies, programs, services, processes, and operations. FRAC submitted a comment in response to this request.

The Early Childhood Nutrition Improvement Act of 2021, anticipated to be introduced by Representatives Bonamici (D-OR) and Herrera Beutler (R-WA), would strengthen and expand access to nutritious meals for young children through enhancements to the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP). The bill proposes many positive changes that better support children and families who depend on CACFP for the healthy meals and snacks that the program provides.

The Afterschool Nutrition Programs offered an important opportunity to combat hunger during the 2020–2021 school year as communities and families continued to feel the educational, health, and economic impacts of COVID-19. Read the 2021 report to learn more.

Annual estimates of food insecurity are released every year from the Census Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS). Surveyed participants were interviewed in December 2020 about food insecurity in the prior 12 months. This resource summarizes those findings.