{"id":292077,"date":"2026-09-23T06:24:24","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T06:24:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/292077\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T06:24:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T06:24:24","slug":"new-report-shows-rising-food-insecurity-rates-in-pennsylvania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/292077\/","title":{"rendered":"New report shows rising food insecurity rates in Pennsylvania"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">DAUPHIN COUNTY, Pa. (WHTM) &#8211; Central Pennsylvania Food Bank has released its <a data-ylk=\"slk:2026 Food Insecurity in Pennsylvania;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;link&quot;,&quot;yLinkElementType&quot;:&quot;article_link&quot;}\" href=\"https:\/\/www.centralpafoodbank.org\/take-action\/policy-research\/2026-food-insecurity-pennsylvania-report\/#ReadTheResearch\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">2026 Food Insecurity in Pennsylvania<\/a> report.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">It found that the number of people struggling with food access has jumped by more than 50% since 2020, with nearly 300,000 Pennsylvanians losing Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits since 2024.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;We&#8217;ve had a three-pronged crisis of challenges with inflation, food price inflation continues to be persistent, causing affordability challenges, but also drops in participation to the SNAP program,&#8221; said Central PA Food Bank Chief Strategy Officer Zach Zook.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;For every meal that a food bank provides, SNAP provides nine, so food banks can&#8217;t close the gap of SNAP,&#8221; said Feeding Pennsylvania CEO Julie Bancroft.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">According to a USDA report published in 2025, nationwide household food insecurity was 13.7%.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;Food insecurity as of 2024 was at its highest level since the aftermath of the Great Recession, so since 2014, and we are not in a recessionary time frame,&#8221; Zook said. &#8220;To have these high rates of food insecurity with relatively historically low unemployment rates is a very concerning dynamic.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Loft Community Partnership in Millersville, Lancaster County, says they saw their highest service week ever last week. The organization helps people in need get food.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">People are experiencing higher levels of stress, higher levels of isolation, higher levels of anxiety and worry because of the fact that they&#8217;re unsure that they&#8217;ll be able to have enough food for their families,&#8221; said Executive Director Jenna Graeff.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The food bank&#8217;s report also found that child insecurity rates outpace overall rates in all 67 counties in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<a data-ylk=\"slk:For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to ABC27.;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;link&quot;,&quot;yLinkElementType&quot;:&quot;article_link&quot;}\" href=\"https:\/\/www.abc27.com\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to ABC27.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DAUPHIN COUNTY, Pa. (WHTM) &#8211; Central Pennsylvania Food Bank has released its 2026 Food Insecurity in Pennsylvania report.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":292078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[5706,7301,28,30,29,4610],"class_list":["post-292077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-food-bank","tag-food-insecurity","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-snap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=292077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/292077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=292077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=292077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=292077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}