Millions of Brits can’t afford to buy enough food. How do we feed a hungry nation?

In the UK, one in six households lives with food insecurity, meaning they struggle to access a reliable and healthy source of sustenance.  

Despite the abundance on supermarket shelves, millions of people can’t afford to buy enough to eat – or buy the nutritious food they need. Others can’t easily reach a supermarket and are forced to cut portions or rely on cheap, calorie-dense convenience options to get by.  

For households with children, the situation is even bleaker. Nearly one in five worry about their next meal, struggle to afford nutritious options or face the stigma of visiting a food bank. In some of the hardest-hit parts of the country, such as areas of the West Midlands, this figure rises to one in three. 

For those living with food insecurity, skipping meals or going entire days without eating has become a grim reality. But this isn’t just about hunger; millions of people are denied access to nutritious food by a failing system, and it’s causing lasting societal harm. Decades of political decisions and welfare reform have stripped away social safety nets, leaving families increasingly vulnerable to rises in the cost of living.  

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When finances tighten, food budgets get cut. Portions shrink, meals are skipped, and nutritious options are replaced by cheaper, processed, higher-calorie alternatives.  

Food poverty is a paradox of over- and under-nutrition, leaving people both overfed and undernourished. It’s a crisis that is damaging health, undermining productivity and widening societal inequalities. 

The cost of inaction 

Food bank queues have been getting longer. Last year Trussell handed out nearly three million emergency food parcels, a 50% increase over five years and a near record high. That figure is only part of the picture. Countless parcels distributed by informal food banks, faith groups and other charities are not included, but they’re quietly meet rising need every day. 

Behind every food parcel is a person or family struggling to feed themselves and paying a price far greater than hunger. Anxiety and depression are common for people living in food poverty, limited calorie intake – or reliance on unhealthy options – drains energy and focus, and daily life becomes a struggle.  

For children, hunger and undernutrition make it difficult to concentrate and thrive at school, with clear consequences for their future life opportunities. Poor diet in childhood can shape health, education and life chances for decades. In the UK, our children are now, on average, shorter than those in nearly every other high-income country. It’s a stark reminder of how far short the current policies fall in meeting the basic needs of the next generation.  

Responsibility for putting healthy food on the table is often pushed onto individuals, making food insecurity a personal failing rather than a structural issue. People are told to budget better, shop smarter and make healthier choices, but we’ve built a world where convenience food is cheap and easy, and healthy eating is priced outside an ordinary household budget.  

Read more:

• How often do you get your five-a-day?
• Hunger is a political choice. Could a ‘Right to Food’ change everything?
• UK’s food poverty crisis is spiralling out of control – and there’s only one way to fix it

How did we get here?  

The UK food system is a consequence of decades of neoliberal economic policy; a political ideology that has weakened social safety nets. Welfare systems have been underfunded and restructured, leaving households vulnerable and without essential support in times of hardship. Once hard-working communities, hollowed out by deindustrialisation and job losses during the Thatcher era, are trapped by decades of underinvestment. Economic decline and high unemployment still define many of these neighbourhoods, which today rank among the most deprived, and food insecure, in the country.  

Austerity measures introduced since 2010 have only deepened structural inequalities. Tax and benefit reforms have reduced the disposable incomes of the poorest fifth of households by around 10%, and many households have been left with little to fall back on.  

More recently, the war in Ukraine has triggered global shocks in food and fuel markets, driving prices to record highs. In April 2022 alone, the energy price cap jumped by 54%, and since then food prices have risen by nearly 30%, forcing households to make impossible choices between heating their homes and eating. Energy costs have eased somewhat since, but they are still far from pre-2022 levels and those most vulnerable to increases in the cost of living are still struggling.  

 Retiring the food desert concept 

In the late 90s, scholars began to acknowledge the impact of postwar suburbanisation on food access and inequalities. As out-of-town supermarkets expanded and local high streets declined, many communities were left with limited access to affordable, healthy food, and the term ‘food desert’ was coined.  

Almost three decades later, it’s far beyond time to retire the traditional ‘food desert’ concept. The issue of food insecurity extends much deeper than distances and travel time. Many households living with food poverty are within walking distance of a retailer but simply cannot afford them due to stagnant wages and soaring food prices.  

Physical access still matters but the drivers of food insecurity are more nuanced and often intersect to create a ‘perfect storm’ of circumstance.  

The Priority Places for Food Index was developed in 2022, by the University of Leeds and the consumer rights group, Which?. It aimed to identify areas across the UK most in need of support to access affordable and healthy food by considering the diverse drivers of need within each neighbourhood.  

Built from 17 variables across seven themes, the index maps not only show how far the nearest food retailer is, but also barriers that make it difficult for people to put food on the table. It captures travel times and access to retailers, alongside other data such as income deprivation, car access, fuel poverty, and households with children.   

As the data is available at neighbourhood level, the Priority Places for Food Index allows policymakers and local organisations to understand what type of support is required, and design interventions that address root causes and not just symptoms. Across the UK, policymakers, charities, retailers, nutritionists and consumer groups use the index to target support. Helping to close the food inequality gap.  

Fixing a broken system 

Addressing food insecurity requires action from both directions – bottom up and top down. At the community level, place-based initiatives such as community kitchens, urban agriculture schemes and local food partnerships have emerged organically to fill gaps left behind by the state. Our work at the University of Leeds has shown that these grassroots organisations provide vital support to communities in priority places for food, where safety nets have worn thin.  

These initiatives also run cooking and other skills-based classes, promote financial independence and career readiness, and improve local access to fresh food. They offer myriad benefits, contributing to wellbeing and resilience, and tackling the root causes of food insecurity, yet often operate on shoestring budgets with little financial or policy support. Without political backing or stable investment, their potential remains constrained. Far too many are forced to focus on emergency provision. They run the risk of becoming permanent crisis-management centres and losing sight of their core purpose – to tackle the root causes of food insecurity through long-term focus.  

At the policy level, change has been slow and far less ambitious than the scale of the problem demands. There have been signs of progress, though not nearly fast enough.  

As of September 2026, all children in households receiving universal credit will be eligible for free school meals, a welcome step which the government says will benefit “half a million more children”. But it comes with limitations. Enrolment isn’t automatic and many eligible families risk missing out due to inconsistent local implementation.  

The benefits of providing every child with a balanced meal once a day shouldn’t be underestimated. But even with changes to free school meals, far too many children will still fall through the cracks. Current policy approaches focus on incremental reform rather than structural and systemic change. Eligibility thresholds, benefit caps and administrative burdens continue to restrict access to support, while the broader welfare system remains under strain.  

Food is a right, not a privilege 

Ending food insecurity in the UK will take more than goodwill and food banks. The Food Foundation’s Roadmap to Reducing Food Insecurity offers a clear starting point, calling for a national strategy that recognises the Right to Food in law, ensuring that access to healthy and nutritious food is treated as a necessity not a privilege.  

Yes, we need to open affordable food retailers in neighbourhoods where access is limited, but more importantly, we need to create support systems that work for people and not against them. Automatic enrolment for free school meals is a no brainer and removes unnecessary bureaucracy. Place-based food initiatives, already filling gaps left by the state, should have secure funding, allowing them to focus on resilience and community development, rather than crisis management.  

Finally, food policy cannot sit in isolation. It must be integrated across education, health and welfare to promote food literacy, increase access to nutritious food options, improve health outcomes, and create meaningful change.  

We have the evidence and data to tackle the root causes of food insecurity and to build a fairer food system for everyone, but we need the political will and courage to act.  

Rachel Oldroyd is a lecturer within the School of Geography at the University of Leeds.

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