FILE - A person shops at an Urban Gleaners Free Food Market in Portland, Ore., in this May 25, 2023, file photo. A new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that more Oregonians were food insecure in 2023 than in 2020.
Crystal Ligori / OPB
More Oregonians were food insecure, couldn’t afford groceries or outright skipped meals in 2023, compared to 2020. That’s according to an annual U.S. Department of Agriculture household food security report released Wednesday.
While inflation is cooling down, prices at grocery stores still remain high for many people. In Oregon, food insecurity rates rose sharply to 12% from 2021-2023, an increase from 9.2% from 2018-2020, according to the USDA report. That means more than 400,000 people – including many of the state’s children – were food insecure, or didn’t know where their next meal was coming from.
The state was one of six states where very low food security rates rose as well – essentially when people are in a more severe situation and are skipping meals because they can’t afford adequate food. Nationally, 13.5% of households were food insecure at least sometime during the year.
The report aligns with the spike in need for emergency food assistance across Oregon over the last few years, said Morgan Dewey, a spokesperson for the Oregon Food Bank.
“For the last couple of years we’ve seen a record-breaking number of visits across our more than 1,400 food assistance sites across Oregon and Southwest Washington,” Dewey said. “This data absolutely confirms the anecdotes that we’ve seen on the ground and what those local food pantries are saying.”
Sarah Weber-Ogden, co-executive director for Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon, said she attributes the sharp increase to the rising cost of living, but also to the end of pandemic-era assistance programs, which kept many families afloat during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s really showing us that government programs that provide access to food are actually very successful in keeping our neighbors out of food insecurity,” she said. “And that can give us a roadmap for moving forward and taking next steps in light of this data.”
Weber-Ogden said going into the 2025 state legislative session, she and other advocates will make universal free school meals a top priority, which would help address hunger among children. While free meals are available in all three of Oregon’s largest school districts, that’s not the case for all schools, Weber-Ogden said.
“We’re not all the way there…we have a small gap to close to get there, but it is going to require that lawmakers prioritize this now,” she said.
Dewey said the Oregon Food Bank, along with other advocates, including Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon, will work to introduce the Food for All Oregonians policy during next year’s legislative session as well. The bill would extend benefits similar to SNAP, informally known as food stamps, to over 62,000 Oregonians currently ineligible to apply because of their immigration status.
“This would directly put money in people’s pockets to buy food,” she said. “It would get Oregon off the list of those [high food insecurity] states.”
For Weber-Ogden, the report overall highlights the need for stronger policies to reduce food insecurity rates.
“This data really should be a wake up call to lawmakers in a state as abundant as Oregon,” she said.
“There’s no reason why we should be seeing food insecurity rates like this.”