Food insecurity, austerity, and household food production in Greece, 2009–2014

Abstract

Despite the severity of the European economic crisis, its relation to key aspects of material deprivation remains understudied. In this paper, I use the Statistics on Income and Living Conditions dataset to analyze household food insecurity in austerity-ridden Greece between 2009 and 2014. First, I show that low-income, low-asset and non-EU citizens, as well as households in Athens and island regions, are more likely to experience higher rates of food insecurity. Second, low-income and immigrant households experience disproportionate increases in food insecurity during the crisis; low-income and single-mother households experience higher increases in child food insecurity during the same period. Third, I examine the hypothesis that households turned to the land during the crisis. I show evidence of a negative association between food self-provisioning and food insecurity; however, the share of households that produce food decreases during the crisis, casting doubt on self-provisioning as a widespread coping strategy.

Keywords:

• Food insecurity
• Greece
• austerity
• self-provisioning
• material deprivation

JEL Codes:

• B50
• I30
• Q18

Disclosure statement

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

Data availability statement

This study is based on confidential data from Eurostat, EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions for years 2009 (release 7) and 2014 (release 3). Restrictions apply to the availability of this data, which were used under license for this study. The responsibility for all conclusions drawn from the data lies entirely with the author.

Notes

1 See Eurostat database, accessed September 21, 2021.

2 The 13th monthly payment was paid to civil servants and pensioners before Christmas, and the 14th monthly payment was split between Easter and the summer. Thus, the elimination of these two payments constituted a 14.3% decline in annual salaries and pensions.

3 It is not possible to locate the municipality in which surveyed households reside. Thus, one cannot examine other important aspects of food access, such as proximity to food banks and community kitchens, or the presence of institutions and processes that may lead to community food security (M. D. Anderson & Cook 1999).

4 The 2009 figure for Greece is lower than the EU-27 population-weighted average figure (9.5%), placing Greece 15th of 27 EU countries at the time. The 2014 figure, on the other hand, is substantially above the EU-27 average figure in 2014 (10.2%), moving Greece to 11th place among the EU-27.

5 This could be related to the introduction of legislation (Law 3869/2010) that restricted banks' ability to auction off primary residences in cases of non-performing laws if the value of the home did not exceed 200,000 euros.

6 I use linear probability models due to the straightforward result interpretation. In Appendix A I reach similar conclusions using logistic regression models.

7 Equivalized disposable household income is defined by dividing disposable household income by equivalized household size: the latter is equal to 1 (for the first household member), plus 0.5 for every additional member aged 14 and over, plus 0.3 for every child under 14.

8 When using the logistic regression model, the effect of self-provisioning on food insecurity is negative and statistically significant at the 10% level in two out of five specifications. When restricting the sample to lower-income households, however, the relationship between self-provisioning and food insecurity is stronger than in the main text and statistically significant in all five specifications. Moreover, the year-effect is substantially higher when restricting the sample to lower income households.

9 These results are robust to a logistic regression estimation (Table A2) and to restricting the sample to lower-income households (Table B2).

10 Table A3 indicates a stronger connection between single motherhood and inability to provide children with daily fruit and vegetables. Similarly among lower-income households (Table B3) three out of five specifications yield a statistically significant coefficient of the effect of single motherhood on inability to provide children with daily fruit and vegetables.

11 Results were similar when limiting the sample to households in the bottom two quintiles of equivalized disposable household income.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Charalampos Konstantinidis

Charalampos Konstantinidis is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Boston. His primary research interests revolve around the political economy of agriculture and food in Europe.