Framework for social sustainability from a food insecurity perspective

Social sustainability is a positive condition where all systems and structures within a community have relationships between them that generate enough current and future capacity to develop and sustain a healthy and flourishing community. To achieve social sustainability within a society, food is the most essential element. In the US, about 23.5 million people live in food deserts, nearly half of which are considered low-income. In addition, 12.3% of U.S households are subject to food insecurities in 2016. It is conjectured that there is a strong relationship between poverty, food insecurity, health facility availability, food deserts and food bank. The overarching problems are how can a quantitative relationship between these various factors considered above be obtained, and how can the statistics conducted from studies be used to build models for fair and equitable food distribution from food banks to reduce and minimize food insecurity. In this paper, the data related to the above factors are systematically analyzed in the attempt to lay a roadmap for future direction in this area.