food insecure

adjective

variants: or less commonly food-insecure

Definition of food insecure

: unable to consistently access or afford adequate food According to data released last week by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 17 percent of Americans—more than 50 million people—live in households that are "food insecure," a term that means a family sometimes runs out of money to buy food, or it sometimes runs out of food before it can get more money.— Lisa Miller A food-insecure household may be faced with the difficult choice of paying for basic necessities, such as health care and housing, or buying nutritionally adequate foods.— Elyse Miller

Examples of food insecure in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web Almost one in four Massachusetts Latinos is food insecure. — Globe Staff, BostonGlobe.com, 11 May 2022 According to the World Food Program, 17 million Yemenis are food insecure; that number is projected to reach 19 million by the end of the year. — Robinson Meyer, The Atlantic, 4 May 2022 There are more than 400,000 Connecticut residents who are food insecure, Jakubowski said. — Ted Glanzer, Hartford Courant, 27 Apr. 2022 An estimated 693,000 people or just under 10% of the population in the region are currently estimated to be severely food insecure, up from 6% in April 2021. — Daphne Ewing-chow, Forbes, 26 Apr. 2022 Cheap land in the global south would continue to be exploited for carbon removal deployment, sometimes monopolizing land use in places that are already food insecure. — Andrew Bergman, The New Republic, 11 Apr. 2022 Today, Hogsett said, one in every six Indianapolis residents remains food insecure. — Arika Herron, The Indianapolis Star, 13 Apr. 2022 There’s been fewer food rations sent to Yemen, where 16.2 million people are food insecure and pockets of famine-like conditions persist. — Chloe Sorvino, Forbes, 13 Apr. 2022 And for families who are food insecure, the daily struggle to keep bellies full can become even more fraught. — Washington Post, 10 Apr. 2022 See More

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'food insecure.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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Dictionary Entries Near food insecure

foodie

food insecure

food insecurity

Statistics for food insecure

Last Updated

18 May 2022

Cite this Entry

“Food insecure.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/food%20insecure. Accessed 18 May. 2022.

Style: MLA

MLA