Teaching Poor People About Food Is Not the Answer

And are we even asking the right questions?

Photo by Conscious Design on Unsplash

I've started and scrapped and restarted this essay several times. Imagine the camera zooming in on a wastebasket filled with crumpled typewritten pages, my thoughts written in red pen across the top. Too mean, this introduction about how teaching people a new recipe won't help them eat more vegetables. Too accusatory, this one asking if the skills you are teaching were requested by the people you teach. Be more human.

Because the desire to teach is at the core of being human. We want to pass on knowledge, skills, culture, everything we have learned that we do not want to be lost. Education is a necessary component of changing food systems, not only for the skills and information shared, but also for the relationships built and strengthened, for the increased confidence and self-efficacy of individuals, and more. 

We need it! But it is not everything. And emphasizing individual food education without also pushing for systemic change is problematic, particularly when those you are teaching are disproportionately burdened by systems of oppression.

Educating people was the primary strategy for change I learned in my dietetics education. You make a handout and pass it out to people and explain its contents in a dynamic and engaging way, maybe with a demo, and you're done. The appeal is clear. It's easy to plan and to capture the metrics: 150 participants educated about the nutrients in collard greens, 200 recipe cards for reduced-sodium butternut squash soup distributed. It usually makes for good pictures, which look good in reports to funders, or on your website.

Were the people you were targeting not doing the thing you wanted (eating five servings of vegetables daily) because they lacked the knowledge you imparted (vegetables are good for you, here's an easy recipe)? Did a significant number of them identify that lack of knowledge as a barrier?

In my experience, the answer to both questions is usually no. Because actually, the people who are most often the targets of this type of education—low-income BIPOC people—know that vegetables are good for you. Researchers examining how low-income families shop for and prepare food have consistently found that the majority of participants know what nutritious foods are and that eating more of them is good for overall health. From researchers who spoke with mostly low-income, mostly BIPOC residents of Central Texas about their perceptions of healthy food access:

In our study, focus group participants were very knowledgeable of what it means to eat healthy…Participants unanimously agreed that a variety of F&V [fruits and vegetables] is an essential part of a more healthful diet. They listed F&V as more healthful because—in their opinion—these foods provide vitamins, nourishment, strength, help lower cholesterol, cause one to think clearly, and prevent diet-related diseases….Results from other studies concur with our findings that levels of knowledge about healthy foods among low-income shoppers tends to be high, suggesting that lack of knowledge is not the driving factor influencing food purchasing and dietary behaviors among this population.¹

A study that involved participant observation, in-depth interviews, and focus groups with low-income, primarily African American parents found:

Participants demonstrated an extensive knowledge of strategies for healthy eating and motivations to purchase foods they considered healthy….Participants were concerned about feeding their families “fresh” and “natural” foods, and shopping for their health conditions—primarily high blood pressure and diabetes—by seeking products with less sodium and sugar. Results indicate that participants understood the strategies they would need to apply to achieve healthy eating and to avoid unhealthy eating.²

(The main barrier to healthy eating identified in both studies? The high price of healthy foods.)

And it doesn't just stop at nutrition knowledge; a study comparing the attitudes and preferences of food-secure and food-insecure households in Poughkeepsie, NY—a city with a large population of Black and Hispanic or Latine residents, where one in four households is considered food insecure—found that there were no significant differences in "household food consciousness." Members of food-insecure households were just as likely to read labels, prefer shopping at stores that sold healthy foods, and prefer organic foods as members of food-secure households. They were no more likely to prefer foods that stay fresh longer (i.e., processed foods).

[O]ur study suggests that knowledge about how to shop and choose foods well is not as stratified as many commentators and activists think it is….This casts doubt upon the value of further educational interventions into food insecure households and urban food systems. Not that food education is not important, but it is possible that a general baseline of food knowledge has diffused sufficiently across social and institutional strata. This Poughkeepsie study suggests that allocating further resources into reaching and teaching food-insecure households and other groups at the bottom of social and cultural hierarchies might yield only diminishing returns.³

This isn't to say that education can't be helpful on an individual basis—plenty of research also supports nutrition and cooking education for increasing food-related skills and changing behavior in individuals—but as Alkon et al. bluntly put it in "Foodways of the Urban Poor," a paper bringing together numerous qualitative studies with mostly low-income, Black and Latine residents of "food deserts" in Chicago and Oakland:

[E]ducation is a popular solution in part because it invokes the neoliberal prescription towards personal responsibility and constant self-improvement, and does not challenge the state to provide services such as healthcare or a healthy environment….Indeed, a focus on education locates the problem in the knowledges of low-income people, and blames them for not ‘‘knowing’’ what to eat, rather than redressing the systemic patterns of racism and economic underdevelopment that have shaped the built environments in which they live. In other words, it blames the victims of underdevelopment, rather than supporting their coping strategies and their preferred ways of living and eating.⁴

The people interviewed in this paper identified economic underdevelopment and disinvestment in their neighborhoods as a reason why they couldn't access high-quality, affordable food in their own communities and had to travel elsewhere to grocery shop. To overcome that barrier, they had their own coping strategies: borrowing an aunt's truck, buying enough fresh produce for a week and filling the rest of their monthly shop with canned and frozen produce, or sharing grocery trips and gas costs with friends. They did not talk about gaps in their knowledge of food or cooking; in fact, many spoke extensively about cooking techniques and thoughtful strategies for buying and preparing nutritious meals.

Supporting their coping strategies and their preferred ways of living and eating. What might that look like? I'm thinking about a project I was a part of in New Orleans, which involved one of the corner stores I worked with, when I was in grad school. That particular store was one of the most successful in the program, selling a lot of fresh produce partly because it was located across from Guste Homes, a subsidized apartment complex for elderly residents, in a neighborhood without a grocery store in walking distance. In contrast to other corner store shoppers, who might buy one or two pieces of fruit, many of the building residents would leave with bulging bags of produce and other grocery items. The owners of the store were extremely kind and went out of their way to stock the items their customers needed, but I don't think it's inaccurate to call doing the bulk of your grocery shopping there a "coping strategy." The store couldn't stock everything they needed.

Over time, a strong relationship formed between the store owners, the corner store program coordinator, and some of the building residents who were interested in helping the store better serve their needs. One popular request was more fresh food items that didn't require additional preparation but could still be purchased using SNAP benefits, and a USDA grant allowed for an innovative approach to meeting that need. A group of graduates from Liberty's Kitchen—a culinary-focused youth development and leadership training nonprofit—learned design thinking principles at Tulane's Taylor Center, then used those new skills to collaborate with a group of Guste residents, with a goal of developing a handful of grab-and-go food items that would meet the taste preferences and budgets of the elderly residents. The corner store owners were eager to carry whatever items the group decided on.

They talked and prototyped and tasted together. At the center, always, were the needs and opinions of the residents. The project was supporting their coping strategy (shopping for food at the corner store across the street) and their preferred ways of living and eating (purchasing nutritious food that required little to no preparation). No one tried to educate them about how to change what they were doing. Their choices and needs were respected.⁵

The Liberty’s Kitchen and Guste Homes Krewe

Maybe your job involves providing food education. Maybe you are wondering if there is anything you can approach differently. Maybe you can ask yourself: How are you developing your educational content? Are you starting with the identified needs of the communities you are serving, or are your offerings based on the "knowledge gaps" you or your funders have identified? How do you support the coping strategies people have devised to feed themselves? How do you incorporate their preferred ways of living and eating?

Maybe this is not possible right now. (It was not possible when I was working at a nonprofit, basically doing all corner store program coordination solo, with other job responsibilities on top.) But maybe just thinking about it will make a difference when the next grant opportunity comes up, when it is a choice between funding another round of education and trying something new. 

And here I am educating you, and hoping I'm respecting your coping strategies, as you go about your work with its many constraints. I hope this is inspiring and not shaming. I hope it opened up a door to a new idea or two, or supported a feeling you've been having for awhile. And if you ever want to share your needs and priorities with me, I'm always here for it.

1. Evans, A., Banks, K., Jennings, R., Nehme, E., Nemec, C., Sharma, S., Hussaini, A., & Yaroch, A. (2015). Increasing access to healthful foods: A qualitative study with residents of low-income communities. The International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 12(Suppl 1), S5. Full paper can be read here.

2. Zachary, D. A., Palmer, A. M., Beckham, S. W., & Surkan, P. J. (2013). A Framework for Understanding Grocery Purchasing in a Low-Income Urban Environment. Qualitative Health Research, 23(5), 665–678. Full paper can be read here.

3. Nevarez, L., Tobin, K., & Waltermaurer, E. (2016). Food Acquisition in Poughkeepsie, NY: Exploring the Stratification of “Healthy Food” Consciousness in a Food-Insecure City. Food, Culture & Society, 19(1), 19–44. Abstract can be viewed here.

4. Alkon, A. H., Block, D., Moore, K., Gillis, C., DiNuccio, N., & Chavez, N. (2013). Foodways of the urban poor. Geoforum, 48(Supplement C), 126–135. Abstract can be viewed here.

5. You can learn more about this program here and here. I wish I had a happy ending for it, but I do not. Shortly after the conclusion of the project, the participating corner store was kicked out of its building and replaced with a gas station/fried chicken chain that had no interest in stocking fresh produce. Guste Homes residents and many others appealed city councilmembers to fight this change, without success. But in better news, several years later the rapper Master P helped to bring a small food market into the Guste Homes complex with the support of a local grocery chain whose co-owner was spotted at the January 6th riots a few months prior and which may have been looking for some opportunities for good PR. Only in New Orleans, as they say.