Don’t Starve The Data: Why Reporting On Hunger Matters
While food insecurity is on the rise and millions of Americans are grappling with rising costs, economic uncertainty, and fragile social safety nets, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s decision to cancel its longstanding Household Food Security Report is especially troubling.
What an insult to humanity by announcing this decison during September, the Hunger Action Month, as designated by Feeding Amercia going back to 2007. The annual survey has been a critical tool in understanding who is going hungry, how severe the problem is, and whether public programs are actually working. Doing away with it doesn’t make food insecurity vanish—it makes it harder to see, to measure, and to address.
Related Knowledge Center: Information integrity
In an increasingly fractured media landscape, truth has been a casualty in the public discussion. Coverage has been warped by the business needs of struggling news organizations, and a significant segment of the public relies on bad-faith outlets that are little more than propagandists. While fact-checking has become routine, some organizations are exploring other ways to combat the trends. And misinformation spewed by AI-driven chatbots has become more of a feature than simply a bug.
Fact-checking and its detractors