UK targets food insecurity and inequality with six new national projects

The UK government has unveiled six projects to address growing concerns around food insecurity, particularly among low-income and vulnerable groups. The aim is to find scalable solutions to ensure healthier diets and improve food security amid a surge in living prices.

The rising cost of living is driving food insecurity in the UK, with 7.5 million people affected monthly in 2023-2024. This marks an increase of 300,000 from 2022-2023 and 2.5 million from 2019-2020.

“Everyone should have access to healthy, nutritious food, but we know the number of food-insecure households across the UK is increasing,” says professor Alison Park, head of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI’s) “creating opportunities, improving outcomes” theme. 

“These innovative projects from across the UK — from Wales to Dundee, Nottingham to the Isle of Wight — will go a long way in helping us understand how to tackle food inequalities and what interventions really make a difference.”

UKRI will fund the new projects by focusing on research that improves outcomes for people and places across the UK by identifying solutions that promote economic and social prosperity.

Toward better food accessibility

The UKRI’s projects aim to enhance the accessibility of nutritious food and potentially tackle food waste by making good food more available to people who need it.

The UKRI projects aim to improve access to nutritious food and reduce food waste.In Liverpool, a social housing mapping tool will use a mobile greengrocer, “Queen of Greens,” to visit areas where social housing residents have poor access to food and offer food vouchers. Researchers will then forecast the resulting effects on health.

The University of Liverpool will lead the project with a funding of £1,528,753 (US$2,079,418).

Science and Technology Secretary Peter Kyle emphasizes that interventions like the Queen of Greens are important, and measuring their impact is vital.

“These projects will draw on the power of research to actively explore the best ways to get healthy food into the mouths of those who need it, potentially having a transformational effect on people’s lives, and fulfilling the missions set in our Plan for Change.”

Targeting local food inequalities

Funds worth £1,537,037.49 (US$2,090,742) will be used in a project led by the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex to pilot two state-subsidized eateries in Dundee and Nottingham. The “public restaurants” will offer nutritious meals to deprived households, especially those with children.

By assessing community food markets in Glasgow, another project will determine the impact of community food markets in food deserts, incorporating art and food literacy to promote healthier eating. The University of Glasgow will lead this project with £1,054,119 (US$1,433,896) in funding.

A project led by University of Southampton with £1,564,105 (US$2,127,619.3) worth of funds on the Isle of Wight, New Forest, and Southampton, will improve the nutritional quality of food available at food pantries by linking them to suppliers through online platforms.

The project will also target better free school meals in Wales, where £1,313,993 (US$1,787,537.2) worth of funds led by Cardiff University will be used to assess the nutritional quality of these meals and recommend ways to improve food offerings and increase participation.

Meanwhile, the University of Cambridge will lead a project with £1,574,905 (US$2,142,478) in funding to conduct workshops in local authorities with more deprived populations. The main focus will be working with them to develop and implement new policies to reduce local food inequalities.