COVID-19, Food Insecurity, and Migration

In this policy piece, we investigate the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)–food-insecurity migration channel and develop a policy agenda. The interaction between COVID-19 and the drop in economic activity will lead to increased food insecurity within and across countries. Higher food insecurity ma...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Journal of Nutrition Vol. 150; no. 11; pp. 2855 - 2858
Main Authors Smith, Michael D, Wesselbaum, Dennis
Format Journal Article Web Resource
LanguageEnglish
Published United States Elsevier Inc 01.11.2020
Oxford University Press
American Institute of Nutrition
Subjects
Commerce
Coronaviruses
COVID
COVID-19
COVID-19 - epidemiology
COVID-19 - virology
Current distribution
Economic conditions
Emigration and Immigration - legislation & jurisprudence
Epidemics
Food
Food Insecurity - economics
Food security
Health Policy
Humans
immigration policy
inequality
International migration
Issues and Opinions
Migration
Pandemics
Prevalence
Rural Population
Rural urban migration
SARS-CoV-2
Socioeconomic Factors
Urban Population
Viral diseases
COVID
migration
inequality
immigration policy
food security
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:In this policy piece, we investigate the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)–food-insecurity migration channel and develop a policy agenda. The interaction between COVID-19 and the drop in economic activity will lead to increased food insecurity within and across countries. Higher food insecurity may act as a multiplier for the epidemic due to its negative health effects and increased migration. Research has shown that food insecurity affects within-country and cross-border migration. Besides the mean prevalence rate, the distribution of food insecurity affects the migration decision. The impacts of COVID-19 are particularly strong for people in the lower tail of the food-insecurity distribution. In the current context, the effect of food insecurity therefore could be increased migration, including both rural–urban migration and international migration. Importantly, the crisis might lead to a structural break in migration patterns. People might avoid heavily affected COVID-19 destination countries (e.g., United States, Italy, or Spain) and move to other countries. Due to the persistent nature of migration flows, this could have long-lasting effects.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 23
ISSN:0022-3166
1541-6100
DOI:10.1093/jn/nxaa270