New London Near Bottom Of State In UConn Food Security Study

This article was written in part by Associate Regional Editor Eileen McNamara.

New London ranks 163rd out of Connecticut’s 169 towns in terms of its “food security,” as defined by a new University of Connecticut study.

The report, “2012 Community Food Security in Connecticut: An Evaluation and Ranking of 169 Towns,” ranks each town according to how easily its residents  can access healthy, affordable foods.

For instance, towns with easy access to farmer’s markets and other sources of healthy foods would rank higher in food security than communities where residents must travel far from home to find healthy food sources.

According to the data compiled by the UConn researchers, Weston is 
the most food secure town in Connecticut and Hartford is the least food secure.

New London fares better in terms of access to food resources. The city is 19th in the state for access to retail food options and fifth in the state in access to food assistance programs. 

In rankings by population, New London is 24th among 31 cities in Connecticut with populations of 15,000 to 25,000. In this grouping, the city is first in access to food assistance and third in access to food retail. Westport is the top-ranked community in this grouping while Ansonia is last.

The study also took into account the diversity and proximity of all retail food options for residents and the accessibility of food assistance programs in each town.

“Most residents in Connecticut have consistent, dependable access to enough food for active, healthy living,” the study states. “Yet each year there are households that experience limited access to food due to a lack of money or other resources." 

Between 2008 and 2010, 12.7 percent of residents in Connecticut were living in food insecure households (38 percent of which were living in ‘households with very low food insecurity.’) 

Approximately one in seven Connecticut households reported there had been times in the past year when they did not have enough money to buy food that they needed.”

Other factors the study took into account when determining a community’s “food security” included:

• Poverty and unemployment rates in each town
  
• Whether households in each town had access to a vehicle
  
• The education level of a town’s residents