Key Figures from Map the Meal Gap 2024 (2022 data)
Background
Map the Meal Gap (MMG) is Feeding America’s annual study on local food insecurity and food cost. The
2024 release features data as of 2022, the most recent year available. The USDA reported that
nationally, food insecurity remained stable or decreased in 2020 and 2021, but the situation shifted in
2022 due to rising food prices and the continued expiration of COVID-19 pandemic assistance.
Specifically, the overall food insecurity rate rose to 13.5% in 2022, an increase of 31% over 2021 rates.
Map the Meal Gap 2024 estimates reflect this trend. In most counties, MMG food insecurity estimates are higher in 2022 than in 2021, with an average increase of 29% across all counties year over year.
The total annual food budget shortfall reflects the additional dollars that food-insecure individuals report needing to have just enough money to cover their food needs. For 2022, this amounted to a historical high of $33.1 billion, which is a real increase of nearly 43% over the 2021 shortfall ($21.5 billion) and higher than the previous peak of $24.6 billion in 2014 ($30.4 billion in 2022 dollars). The higher national shortfall reflects an increase in both the number of individuals experiencing food insecurity (from 33.8 million in 2021 to 44.2 million in 2022) and the average additional amount needed by food insecure individuals (from $20.91 per week in 2021 to $24.73 per week in 2022). Even after adjusting for annual average inflation, the reported shortfall among people facing hunger in 2022 still increased by 9.5% compared to the previous year, reaching its highest point in the last two decades. This suggests that rising prices, especially food prices, likely contributed to the increase in this resource gap but weren’t the only factor.
