Dignity: Ending Hunger Together in Scotland

Definitions

A variety of definitions are frequently used to describe food poverty, hunger and food insecurity.

In this report we seek to use the term 'food insecurity' to describe the broad phenomenon when people are worried about not having enough food for themselves and their families. We use the term 'food poverty' (or 'hunger') to describe the more extreme, but sadly not unusual, occasions when lack of food results in people going hungry because of a lack of resources.

We have accepted the most widely used definition of food poverty by Professor Elizabeth Dowler (2003) which states: "food poverty is the inability to consume an adequate quality or sufficient quantity of food that is useful for health in socially acceptable ways, or the uncertainty that one will be able to do so." ^[1]

This definition recognises the importance of being able to participate in ways of accessing food which are common to a society and of being free from anxiety about a future ability to do this.