Rural Poor Have Less Access to Supermarkets, Large Grocery Stores

Phillip Kaufman

Rural America/ Rural Development Perspectives, 1998, vol. 13, issue 3

Abstract: Poor households in rural areas rely more on smaller grocery stores and supermarkets than do metro area households, and they may face higher average food prices and reduced access to food as a result. Net accessibility—a ratio of available large grocery store sales to potential food spending by households in a ZIP Code-based area— was found to be lower for a greater percentage of low-income households compared with all households in the Lower Mississippi Delta. Over 70 percent of the total low-income population (eligible to receive food stamp benefits) in the 36-county area suffered accessibility shortfalls, requiring trips of more than 30 miles to reach a large retailer. Smaller foodstores typically offer less variety, fewer lower cost foods, and higher food prices.

Keywords: Community/Rural/Urban Development; Food Security and Poverty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1998
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/289786/files/rdp1098c.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:uersra:289786

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.289786

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Rural America/ Rural Development Perspectives from United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search (aesearch@umn.edu).