Food insecurity is now affecting households that have never been touched by it before. In the last 12 months, 77% of those households experiencing it did so for the first time last year. For the majority of those, the episode was intermittent and brief as they struggled to manage their budget during a cost-of-living crisis. While for a few, it was due to an unexpected event such as the loss of their job or unanticipated medical bills – the more common reasons cited prior to the pandemic.

Food insecurity is not experienced by everyone in the same way. To better understand this, Foodbank has developed a framework based on two key factors - the frequency and length of food insecurity episodes. Food insecure households are grouped to reflect the continuum from crisis (infrequent and short-lived food insecurity) to chronic (ever-present food insecurity).

Being at the crisis end of food insecurity is generally triggered by a community or individual shock, such as a natural disaster or family breakdown. Households in these circumstances often do not see themselves as food insecure, rather as just having a bad patch. Those at the chronic end of food insecurity are generally in vulnerable circumstances, such as intergenerational poverty, long-term unemployment or marginalisation. For these people, food insecurity is a constant in their lives.

We are now seeing increasing numbers of people moving into the crisis end of the food insecurity continuum. During the year, 3 million households went from being food secure to being food insecure. 2.7 million of food insecure households managed to get back to being food secure. The difference is an increase of 383,000 or 3% of the population. The number of households experiencing chronic food insecurity remained stable at around 750,000.

Compared to 2022, the first-time food insecure are increasingly metro (up 4%), middle-income (up 7%), employed (up 5%), mortgage-holding (up 6%) and renting households (up 5%) who experience increased food insecurity. There was also a significant increase in food insecurity amongst households without children (up 6%).

Food insecurity impacts households across a wide variety of demographic and socioeconomic cohorts including previously less vulnerable groups. Looking at all food insecure households, 60% have someone in paid work, which makes it clear that a job does not necessarily insulate a household against going hungry. Also, a half of all renters and a third of all mortgage holders were food insecure in the last 12 months.