Three years since the stay home directive and Washington is still experiencing hunger

Photo courtesy Nils Johnson, Rural Resources
A photo showing the road conditions Rural Resources
encounters when delivering food to rural clients.

By Amber Betts
WSDA Communications

It was the most beautiful countryside you’ve ever seen. Crisp mountain air, gorgeous views and no sign of city life for days. But, traveling just a few miles took all day to traverse because of the remoteness of the location and the road conditions. When the team reached the elderly members of the community to deliver a food box, some of them lived without help, without transportation, and even without water, and some without electricity.

Recently staff from our We Feed Washington pilot food program, a program initiated by the legislature in response to COVID-19 and changes in federal relief programs, visited and rode along with a partner organization that helps distribute food to those in need in a rural county on tribal lands. Along the way, we realized that this program is so much more than home delivered groceries – it can be a real lifeline for people living with the most modest resources in the most remote parts of our state, doubling in many instances as a health and safety check for these tribal elders.

Despite the state’s best efforts, COVID-19’s impact on food insecurity persists. For some, that insecurity has only been exacerbated by the pandemic. For people in poverty in remote and rural locations across our state, a food security crisis has been continuous. The need recently compounded with the expiration of expanded SNAP benefits, leaving many families wondering how they’re going to feed their families, or themselves.

The WAFood Survey, Wave 4, conducted by researchers at the University of Washington, shows that nearly half the households sampled reported being food insecure in the past month. Further, researchers found that more than half of those food insecure households indicated that affording groceries was their top expense of concern, even slightly more than housing. 

The We Feed WA program was launched at the height of the pandemic to help procure and distribute emergency food to those in need as a state alternative to the federal Farmers to Families food box program that ended in abruptly in 2021. This pilot relief program operates as a compliment and in close cooperation with WSDA’s Food Assistance programs. 

After a brief stabilization in 2022, food banks and other hunger relief organizations began seeing demand increase last fall, said Katie Rains, food policy advisor at the Washington State Department of Agriculture. Many of the hunger relief organizations that WSDA partners with through We Feed WA and Food Assistance programs have indicated that they are serving twice as many customers now as they were in 2020, but with dramatically reduced inventory of emergency food, in some cases 80% less than they had on the shelves this time last year. The demand at food banks continues to grow.   

That’s why we (WSDA) helped fund and support the creation of this latest WAFOOD survey, so that the agency and partners in hunger relief across the state could help understand the experience of households and better inform policymakers on how inflation and reduction of COVID-19 benefits were colliding to impact food affordability.

The food supply is down, the need is up, and SNAP benefits have been reduced to the tune of $93 million less in grocery budgets each month, starting this month. This survey has been a valuable resource for understanding how COVID-19 has impacted household diets and food security since the first wave in 2020. The WAFOOD survey is a joint effort between the University of Washington and Washington State University. 

For more information, visit agr.wa.gov/about-wsda/we-feed-wa or email wefeedwa@agr.wa.gov. The pilot program is part of WSDA’s Focus on Food Initiative, ensuring safe, nutritious, local food is effectively produced and available throughout our state.