Federal expenditures for USDA's food assistance programs totaled almost $54.3 billion in fiscal 2007, in excess of 2% more than in the previous fiscal year. The five largest food assistance programs: the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP; formerly the Food Stamp Program), the National School Lunch Program, WIC, the Child and Adult Care Food Program, and the School Breakfast Program; accounted for 95% of USDA's expenditures for food assistance. This report used preliminary data from the FNS to examine trends in the programs through fiscal 2007.
This study, based on 1976-2010 data, examines the relationship between US economic conditions and participation in the USDA ;s five largest nutrition assistance programs. The results of this study strongly suggested that, to varying degrees, economic conditions influenced participation in all of the major nutrition assistance programs, not just in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistant Program (SNAP; formerly the Food Stamp Program).
The report details the potential effects of reductoins in WIC funding for the program and participants (2017-2018).
If WIC age-eligibility is increased from age 5 years to 6 years, 1.47 percent of newly eligible 5-year-olds' families increase their food purchasing power, and become food secure.
Using the Maternal and Infant Health Assessment (MIHA) 2013-2014, this report presents key indicators of maternal and infant health for women who participate in the California Women, Infants and Children […]
In fiscal 2008, the $4.6 billion of food purchased with vouchers from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) generated $1.3 billion in farm revenue. Because WIC participants would have purchased some of these foods with their own money in the absence of the program, the net addition to farm revenue from WIC is estimated at $331 million and the net increase in full-time-equivalent farm jobs at 2,640. The study uses an Input-Output Multiplier Model to derive these estimates and assumes that recent revisions in the WIC food packages were implemented in all States in fiscal 2008.
Abstract: This study, based on 1976-2010 data, examines the relationship between U.S. economic conditions and participation in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s five largest nutrition assistance programs. It also describes […]
This report compares food shopping patterns of (1) Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) households to nonparticipant households, (2) participants in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for Women Infants and Children (WIC) to nonparticipants, and (3) food-insecure to food-secure households.
In October 2014, USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS) and the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) awarded a 3-year, $1.9 M grant to Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) to establish the USDA Behavioral Economics Center for Healthy Food Choice Research (BECR Center). BECR will conduct behavioral economics research to benefit the nutrition, food security and health of all Americans, with special emphasis on facilitating food choice behaviors that would improve the diets of SNAP participants and WIC participants and promote cost-effective program operations. As part of this grant, the BECR Center has funded the development of 5 conceptual white papers that explore innovative behavioral economic approaches to improve the food cost-management of the WIC program while maintaining program participation and effectiveness in promoting improved diets. These papers will be available in Spring 2016 on the BECR website at: https://becr.sanford.duke.edu/.
The WIC NSA Cost Study will provide an updated assessment of the amounts and categories of costs charged to WIC NSA grants and the variation of these costs among State and local agencies. This study will conduct a census of State and local agencies and include 14 case studies to gain a more detailed assessment of NSA cost categories compared to other similar federal programs such as SNAP and TANF.
