Household Food Insecurity

Key Messages
Overall
By Family Type
By Housing Tenure
Technical Notes

Key Messages

• Approximately one-in-five households in Simcoe Muskoka experienced some level of food insecurity from 2021 to 2022. This was not different from the overall provincial experience during the same time.
• Lone parent families experienced the highest rates of food insecurity, more than double what was experienced by couple families with children and more than four-times higher than couple families without children. 
• Households that rent their principal residence have approximately four-times higher rates of food insecurity when compared with households that own their primary dwelling.

Overall

According to the most recent CIS data currently available at the public health unit level, from 2021-2022, 18.0% (13.7%, 22.3%) of Simcoe Muskoka households said they had experienced some level of food insecurity at least once in the past 12 months. This is not significantly different from the 17.4% (16.1%, 18.7%) of Ontario households that reported some level of food insecurity during this same time frame.

By Family Type

Food insecurity is highest among lone parent families in Simcoe Muskoka. Food insecurity among lone parent families is significantly higher than all other types of families, including more than double what was experienced by couple families with children and more than four-times higher than couple families without children.


By Housing Tenure

Housing tenure is identified according to whether a principal residence is owned, with or without a mortgage, or rented.  Food insecurity in Simcoe Muskoka increases significantly among households that rent their principal dwelling when compared with households that own their primary dwelling, with rates of food insecurity approximately four-times higher among renter households.​

Technical Notes

Household food insecurity (HFI) can be defined in several ways and can be estimated using a variety of data sources.  Estimates of household food insecurity (HFI) in Ontario from the Canadian Income Survey (CIS) by public health unit (PHU) were released in an updated report [1] by Public Health Ontario (PHO) in August, 2023. The Canadian Income Survey (CIS) has been adopted as the primary source for reporting household food insecurity at the national and provincial level. This report provides PHU level estimates of HFI using CIS data for the first time. Prior to the release of this report, HFI estimates at the PHU-level were usually obtained using data from the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS). HFI data using CIS data at the PHU level currently does not include any comparison by sub-population (e.g., family type or housing tenure). To better understand how HFI impacts individuals living in Simcoe Muskoka, CCHS data was used to estimate HFI prevalence for specific sub-populations. The purpose of this analysis is to compare relative differences in HFI across these sub-populations, not to estimate the prevalence of HFI for these groups. HFI estimates from the CIS should not be directly compared with those obtained from the CCHS.

PROOF Food Insecurity Policy Research is an interdisciplinary research program studying effective policy approaches to reduce household food insecurity (HFI) in Canada. PROOF defines HFI as the inadequate or insecure access to food due to financial constraints. The main measure of HFI reported by PROOF is “some level” of HFI that includes marginal, moderate, or severe classifications of HFI. Marginal HFI captures concepts like “worrying about running out of food and/or limiting food selection because of lack of money for food.”  Moderate HFI captures concepts like "compromising in quality and/or quantity of food due to a lack of money for food".  Severe HFI captures concepts like "missing meals, reducing food intake, and at the most extreme going without food".

For more information about efforts underway to reduce HHFI in Simcoe Muskoka please visit https://www.simcoemuskokahealth.org/centsless. Also see the Nutritious Food Basket page.

Page last updated September 12, 2023