Food insecurity in South Africa: Evidence from NIDS-CRAM wave 5

ABSTRACT

This article presents the results of the five waves of the National Income Dynamics Study – Coronavirus Rapid Mobile Survey (NIDS-CRAM) on food security between May 2020 and May 2021. Despite significant investments in social protection, food insecurity and household and child hunger remained stubbornly high. We conclude that given the protracted nature of the pandemic, slow economic recovery, household and child hunger have stabilised at higher levels than before the pandemic. The phasing out of emergency relief coupled with the constrained economic situation, are some of the reasons why levels of food insecurity and hunger are likely to remain high in the near future. Strict lockdown regulations also reduced employment and income from informal economic activities. Social support for vulnerable individuals and households remain an urgent priority. Continuing support targeted at households with children is particularly important given the dire consequences of enduring hunger for stunting, and on children’s long-term development.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19 impact
• food insecurity
• hunger
• social protection
• South Africa

Acknowledgements

Evidence This research was completed as part of the NIDS-CRAM initiative: Servaas van der Berg, Leila Patel and Grace Bridgman. July 2021. Food insecurity in South Africa: Evidence from NIDS-CRAM Wave 5. NIDS-CRAM.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Reporting differences cannot be completely ignored. Subjective measure such as these are likely to be answered relative to a reference situation that may differ across individuals. For instance, despite the black population generally being poorer than the coloured population, similar proportions of black and coloured respondents report running out of money for food.

2 The data supplied by DSD was compiled for the 2021 annual report. The monthly statistics are supplied by the provinces to the national Department of Social Development it is verified by the Monitoring and Evaluation units in the provincial and national Departments and is being audited by the Auditor General.

3 There is of course a problem in this measure of targeting, in that there may be some reverse causality (endogeneity), where some households may not lack money for food because of the grants or other support. This reverse causality should not be a large factor for the benefits considered here, as their magnitude is generally too small to pull recipient households out of poverty, unless they have additional incomes.