Food Desert Reaction Paper

Since my last post, I have been thinking about alternate food desert perspectives. In the PBS article I found, Sarah Corapi lists the factors of ingrained eating and shopping habits throughout America. The article suggests these habits could explain the reason the national initiative to fight food deserts appears to be making little difference. Corapi summarizes the findings of a small scale study by Steven Cummins about why the accessibility of healthy food is not always a factor in shopping for it. Corapi states the study “suggests that merely adding a new grocery store to a neighborhood won’t be enough to motivate individuals to shop there for healthier foods.”

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My last source, from the Denver Post, analyzed the lack of supermarket presence in food deserts. While this second article from PBS implies that localities need to look at food education, shopping patterns and increasing nutritional options in smaller food stores as a strategy in eliminating food desert areas. I was surprised to learn that not much progress has been made in the efforts of the national initiatives to solve the food deserts lack of healthy options. It would seem that shopping and eating habits relate an alternate factor in the struggles of food desert areas. …show more content…
I’m curious to know if local strategies for food deserts in Colorado consider shopping and eating patterns. Do Colorado food desert and healthy eating activists take into account the psychological behavior of shopping and eating when planning solutions? I doubt there is enough substantial data to state that increasing supermarkets in food desert is a wasted effort because of human behavior. Finally, this article prompted me to question if there is enough dedication to researching the nutritionally deprived communities of