State of Hunger in San Diego County
This research was conducted with input and guidance from the Hunger Free San Diego advisory board, a collaboration of agencies facilitated by San Diego Hunger Coalition.
1 in 4 people in San Diego County is nutrition insecure.
San Diego Hunger Coalition estimates that, as of June 2024, 1 in 4 (25%) San Diegans experience nutrition insecurity, or are unable to provide three, nutritious meals per day for themselves and/or their families.
Out of the 813,000 total people estimated to be nutrition insecure in San Diego County, 211,000 of them are children, 168,000 are older adults (age 60+), and 133,000 of them are living with disabilities.
Food Assistance: The hunger relief sector provided 24 million meals in food assistance in June.
In June 2024, the hunger relief sector in San Diego County provided 24M million meals across all programs, meeting 73% of the estimated need for food assistance.
Of the 24M meals that were provided in June, 14.8M meals came from CalFresh, followed by food banks and pantries, school meals, the brand new Summer EBT or Sun Bucks program, WIC, and meals for older adults. The pie chart below shows the breakdown in more detail.
Meal Gap: Another 8.8M meals would have been needed for a nutrition secure region
Despite the millions of meals that came from food assistance in June, the county was still short by almost 8.8M meals, meaning thousands of families around the county went hungry during the month.
While the first year of implementation of the SUN Bucks program provided close to 4 million meals to children in need in Summer 2024, over 80,000 children didn't activate their benefits, meaning hundreds of thousands of meals in San Diego were lost. Increasing outreach and education on this program to make sure cards are being mailed to the correct addresses and educating families on the SUN Bucks program could increase benefits and provide more meals to nutrition insecure children in Summer 2025.
The Hunger Coalition has also identified an additional 207,000 people who are likely eligible for CalFresh but not yet enrolled, showing great potential to reduce the 2024 meal gap by increasing CalFresh participation. If all eligible people were enrolled in CalFresh, the meal gap in San Diego County would be reduced to less than 600,000 meals per month.
Recent enrollment data also show that the county is making significant ground on CalFresh enrollment, as there are now 30,000 more people enrolled than there were in Sept. 2023. Enrolling all eligible families is the best way to decrease hunger and mitigate the effects of the loss of the temporary federal programs as providers struggle to keep up with the increased need. For more information on where likely eligible populations are and for CalFresh utilization numbers, please visit www.sdhunger.org/maps-tables.
Nutrition Security and Equity
Nutrition insecurity also disproportionately impacts Black people, Indigenous people, and people of color. The nutrition insecurity rates of these communities are all above the average, as can be seen below.
31% of the Native population
19% of the White population
21% of the Asian population
33% of the Hispanic/Latinx population (across all nationalities)
36% of the Black population
Additional analysis of the nutrition insecure population shows that Hispanic/Latino people make up 33% of the county population, yet they constitute 50% of the nutrition insecure population, which is the largest disparity by race/ethnicity in our region. Data on race/ethnicity is annual, currently estimating San Diego County in 2023.
Methodology
These estimates come from SDHC’s analysis of the estimated population at risk of nutrition insecurity. We define this population as households with incomes below 200% of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) ($62,000 for a family of 4). For the meal gap calculations, we track food assistance data gathered from local agencies and nonprofit partners, with ongoing recommendations from the Hunger Free San Diego Advisory Board. Our detailed methodology can be found at the top of this page.
