Impact of traditional and alternative food security interventions on food security, health and social adaptation of new participants in Montreal, Canada

INTRODUCTION: Prevalence of food insecurity is increasing worldwide. In Canada, interventions addressing food insecurity are implemented by community organizations and can be classified into traditional (i.e., address the urgent need for food) or alternative (i.e,. oriented toward long-term solutions such as social integration and skill development). We evaluated the impact of food insecurity community interventions on participants’ food security status, health and social adaptation.

METHODS: This is a longitudinal study investigating participants new to traditional (n=372) and alternative (n=78) food security interventions. Data were collected at the beginning of the intervention and again after nine months. The clustering effect of organizations was taken into account using multilevel statistical regression analyses.

RESULTS: After nine months, household food security (OR=0.38, c.i. 95%:0.27-0.55), mental health (β=6.01, c.i. 95%:3.90-8.11), social adaptation (β=0.15, c.i. 95%:0.01-0.31) and the quality of  relationships in the  primary network (β=2.54, c.i.95%:0.81- 4.27) significantly  increased among participants in traditional interventions but not among participants in alternative interventions.

DISCUSSION: The effects of alternative interventions might take longer than nine months to appear since these interventions are designed to impact social integration and capacities. This, or the sample size, might account for the lack of significant results we found among alternative interventions. Nevertheless, the positive effects traditional interventions had on social adaptation and quality of  relationships in the  primary network entitle these interventions not only as simple food providers, but also as important avenues to contribute improving life of   participants. These results may be relevant to plan broad-based intervention strategies.