Social Injustice in the Food Industry

By Solyana Mesfin

Food justice typically focuses on the processes that happen between food production and consumption in which food communities distribute nutritious food, while food injustice is inadequate access to enough food in total or the range of foods required to satisfy everyday nutritional needs. People with food inequality frequently consume a nutrient-poor diet, which may lead to obesity, heart disease, asthma,

diabetes, and other chronic diseases making this a part of social injustice. Also children from deprived families facing malnutrition and food shortages have a much poorer health condition than most children do. They get sick more regularly, have significantly higher levels of both iron deficiency anemia and severe ear infections, and are more often admitted to hospital, all because of the lack of affordable nutritious food resources. This leads to more than just a poor nutritious diet, people in these situations miss more school and are known to have higher rates of emotional

problems, mental disorders, and withdrawn or disruptive behavior. Luckily, nowadays, movements in communities are campaigning for systemic reform against food regimes that uphold injustices in all aspects of the food supply chain like maltreatment of agricultural workers, industrialization of meat production pollution, and lack of exposure to healthy food. Things people can do to reduce food injustice in their communities include organizing a food drive, support organizations that benefit this cause, balance food and nutritional security, etc.