{"id":68722,"date":"2025-06-26T07:00:35","date_gmt":"2025-06-26T12:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/?p=68722"},"modified":"2025-07-14T10:56:28","modified_gmt":"2025-07-14T15:56:28","slug":"food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/","title":{"rendered":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Food deserts are widespread across the U.S.\u2014according to the most recent data from the USDA\u2019s Food Access Research Atlas, some <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ers.usda.gov\/data-products\/food-access-research-atlas\/documentation#:~:text=This%20measure%20shows%20that%20an%20estimated%2018.8%20million%20people%2C%20or%206.1%20percent%20of%20the%20U.S.%20population%2C%20live%20in%20low%2Dincome%20and%20low%20access%20tracts%20and%20are%20more%20than%201%20mile%20or%2010%20miles%20from%20a%20supermarket\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">18.8 million Americans<\/a> (6.1% of the population) live in these areas where residents have limited access to affordable and nutritious food.<\/p>\n<p>But what does living in a food desert really <em>mean<\/em>? What do these areas reveal about the experience of people who live there?<\/p>\n<p>To find out, we analyzed nationwide data on food availability, food insecurity, nutrition-related health outcomes, and restaurant landscapes. The results revealed national and state-level trends that presented some intriguing\u2014and, in some cases, surprising\u2014findings about food deserts in America.<\/p>\n<p>But before we dive into our detailed findings and methodology, let\u2019s take a look at some of the key takeaways from our research. (<a href=\"#jump\">Jump down to see our methodology<\/a> )<br \/>\n\t\n\t<div class=\"blog-article-callout-wrap\">\n\t\t<div class=\"blog-article-callout-text\">\n<h3>Food Deserts in America \u2013 Key Takeaways<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>The common belief that food deserts drive poor health outcomes may be overstated\u2014or at least oversimplified, and perhaps not as meaningful as other metrics.<\/li>\n<li>Retail Food Environment Index (RFEI), a common measure of retail food quality, has almost no correlation with food deserts at the national level.<\/li>\n<li>Independent restaurants and access to fresh produce emerge as more meaningful indicators of robust food environments.<\/li>\n<li>In some states, food deserts align with classic signs of poverty and remoteness, while in others, they exist despite a rich food scene or strong infrastructure\u2014suggesting different potential root causes across different regions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\n        <div class=\"tmm-table-of-contents\" tmm-table-of-contents>\n            <div class=\"tmm-table-of-contents__title\">Table of Contents<\/div>\n            <div class=\"tmm-table-of-contents__list\" tmm-table-of-contents__list><\/div>\n        <\/div>\n        \n<h2>Defining Food Access in America<\/h2>\n<p>To understand the forces shaping America\u2019s food deserts, we relied on a blend of federal and nonprofit data, including the USDA\u2019s Food Access Research Atlas, health outcome data from the CDC, and food insecurity statistics from Feeding America. These sources collectively capture the geographic, economic, and behavioral dynamics that influence how\u2014and whether\u2014people can access nutritious food.<\/p>\n<p>Before diving into our findings, it\u2019s worth clarifying three core concepts that appear throughout this analysis:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Food deserts<\/strong>: While still commonly used in public discourse, \u201cfood desert\u201d is something of an outdated term. The USDA now refers more precisely to <a href=\"https:\/\/gisportal.ers.usda.gov\/portal\/apps\/experiencebuilder\/experience\/?id=a53ebd7396cd4ac3a3ed09137676fd40\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">low-income, low-access census tracts<\/a> (LILA tracts)\u2014defined as areas where a significant share of residents are low-income and live a significant distance from the nearest grocery store. For this project, we used the USDA\u2019s original criteria: more than 1 mile for urban tracts, and more than 10 miles for rural ones.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Retail Food Environment Index (RFEI)<\/strong>: RFEI is a widely cited measure of the <a href=\"https:\/\/escholarship.org\/uc\/item\/7sf9t5wx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">quality of food options in a given area<\/a>. In this analysis, we calculated it as the ratio of \u201cunhealthy\u201d food vendors (fast food restaurants and convenience stores) to \u201chealthy\u201d vendors (supermarkets and grocery stores). A higher score signals a heavier tilt toward unhealthy options.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Food insecurity<\/strong>: Unlike geographic indicators like LILA, food insecurity captures <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ers.usda.gov\/topics\/food-nutrition-assistance\/food-security-in-the-us\/definitions-of-food-security\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">household-level hardship<\/a>: limited or uncertain access to adequate food due to economic constraints. We focused on the broader of the two official categories\u2014low food security\u2014which reflects reduced diet quality or variety, without necessarily indicating a drop in food quantity. This measure offers a more direct window into people\u2019s lived experience of food hardship.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It\u2019s also important to note that the results of this analysis only represent correlations between factors, and do not imply any specific causal relationships.<\/p>\n<h2>What National Correlations Can (and Can\u2019t) Tell Us About Food Deserts<\/h2>\n<p>America\u2019s food system is complicated, and food deserts don\u2019t exist in a vacuum. To better understand the conditions that most often accompany high levels of food inaccessibility, we looked at how food desert prevalence correlates with other factors\u2014like health outcomes, food insecurity, and local food infrastructure\u2014at the national level.<\/p>\n<p>This produced a few surprises, and offered some much-needed clarity around what food deserts really mean in practice.<\/p>\n<h3>Food deserts aren\u2019t a strong predictor of poor health outcomes<\/h3>\n<p>Despite the prominence of \u201cfood deserts\u201d in policy discussions, the LILA score (which measures how many people live in tracts with limited access to grocery stores) shows little correlation with poor health outcomes. But food insecurity\u2014a measure of whether households consistently have access to enough food\u2014tells a very different story. It\u2019s meaningfully correlated with both diabetes (r = <strong>0.498<\/strong>) and obesity (r = <strong>0.396<\/strong>), suggesting that material deprivation, not geography, is the more meaningful driver. This is consistent with a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/lifestyle\/food\/food-deserts-dont-cause-obesity-but-that-doesnt-mean-they-dont-matter\/2018\/08\/22\/df31afc0-a61b-11e8-a656-943eefab5daf_story.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">growing body of evidence<\/a> that food deserts may not play as significant a role in health as was once thought.<\/p>\n<p>This distinction has big implications: while LILA measures where food is, food insecurity measures whether people can afford it\u2014a much stronger predictor of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/holistic-nutrition-and-wellness\/\">the role food plays in nutrition, health, and wellness<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>RFEI scores don\u2019t mean what we think they do<\/h3>\n<p>The Retail Food Environment Index (RFEI) is often used as a shorthand for poor food environments\u2014high RFEI values indicate a higher concentration of fast food and convenience stores relative to healthier grocery options. But RFEI has essentially no correlation with LILA (r = <strong>0.011<\/strong>), which means these two ideas often refer to different places entirely.<\/p>\n<p>While LILA scores highlight geographic isolation, RFEI reflects abundance\u2014specifically, the oversupply of poor-quality food. This helps explain why RFEI scores correlate more strongly with negative outcomes than LILA does. High-RFEI areas may have physical proximity to food, but it\u2019s the wrong kind of food. This aligns with <a href=\"https:\/\/pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/articles\/PMC5708005\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">more recent findings<\/a> that \u201cfood swamps\u201d\u2014areas with elevated RFEI\u2014predict poor health outcomes better than food deserts.<\/p>\n<h3>Produce availability is one of the most telling indicators<\/h3>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/analysis-of-local-food-production\/\">availability of fresh produce<\/a> is one of the strongest differentiators between areas with robust food systems and those without. It is negatively correlated with LILA (r = <strong>-0.199<\/strong>), and positively correlated with the presence of independent restaurants (r = <strong>0.143<\/strong>), both suggesting it\u2019s a hallmark of more complete food ecosystems.<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, though, produce availability has almost no relationship to poor health outcomes. That may lend credence to the idea that geographic or infrastructural access alone isn\u2019t enough to predict residents\u2019 health\u2014food culture, affordability, and consumption patterns matter just as much.<\/p>\n<h3>Independent restaurants tell a more nuanced story<\/h3>\n<p>Independent restaurants\u2014that is, restaurants that are typically run by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/food-entrepreneurship\/\">independent entrepreneurs<\/a> and that aren\u2019t affiliated with major chains\u2014tend to cluster in places where food insecurity is lower (r = <strong>-0.173<\/strong>) and fresh produce is more available (r = <strong>0.143<\/strong>). They are also associated with a lower RFEI score (r = <strong>-0.323<\/strong>), indicating a healthier balance of food offerings.<\/p>\n<p>At the same time, they have very little correlation with LILA, meaning their presence doesn\u2019t necessarily indicate how close people live to a grocery store. All of this suggests that independent restaurants may reflect a more vibrant and varied food culture\u2014and that their presence could serve as a proxy for the health and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/americas-most-diverse-food-cities\/\">diversity of a local food ecosystem<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>Zooming in on Regional Trends<\/h2>\n<p>While those were the trends we saw at the national level, there were some compelling regional and state-level findings as well.<\/p>\n<h3>A Paradox of Plenty in the Northeast<\/h3>\n<p>The Northeast shows some surprising breaks from national patterns. In many states\u2014like New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland\u2014there\u2019s a strong negative correlation between RFEI and food insecurity. That means areas with more unhealthy food options aren\u2019t always the ones where people struggle to eat\u2014likely a reflection of dense urban areas with abundant, if low-quality, food.<\/p>\n<p>At the same time, food insecurity in the Northeast strongly correlates with diabetes, reinforcing national findings that economic hardship, not just geography, drives poor health outcomes. States like Rhode Island, Maine, and Delaware rank especially high on this front.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, the region shows a strong negative correlation between RFEI and independent restaurants. States like Massachusetts and Maryland stand out: where local restaurants are more common, the food environment skews healthier. That suggests small businesses may help counterbalance the dominance of fast food\u2014and that food culture plays a role in shaping access.<\/p>\n<h3>Distance Doesn\u2019t Equal Deprivation in the Midwest<\/h3>\n<p>In the Midwest and Plains, food desert indicators reveal an interesting divide between geography and hardship.<\/p>\n<p>This region shows a strong negative correlation between LILA and diabetes prevalence, suggesting that areas with more limited grocery access don\u2019t necessarily experience worse health outcomes. A similar negative correlation exists between LILA and produce availability, meaning less geographic access generally does mean less fresh food\u2014but not worse health.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, the correlation between food insecurity and diabetes is basically average here\u2014unlike the stronger ties seen in the Northeast and West. That gap suggests something important: in this region, geographic isolation (LILA) doesn\u2019t always align with economic deprivation (food insecurity). Residents may be far from grocery stores, but not necessarily food-insecure\u2014or unhealthy. The result may reflect stronger local resilience or cost-of-living dynamics that soften the blow of food access limitations.<\/p>\n<h3>Access, but not Accessibility in the West<\/h3>\n<p>In the West, food access challenges are shaped less by scarcity\u2014and more, perhaps, by affordability and structural barriers.<\/p>\n<p>Most Western states show a strong positive correlation between fresh produce availability and food insecurity\u2014a counterintuitive finding that suggests nutritious food may be nearby, but not accessible to all. California, however, is a clear outlier, with a near-zero correlation, bucking the regional trend.<\/p>\n<p>The region also shows an above-average correlation between food insecurity and diabetes, underscoring the health risks tied to economic hardship rather than geographic isolation. States like Nevada, Montana, and New Mexico top the list.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, many Western states rank above average for the correlation between LILA and food insecurity, meaning that in this region, distance from grocery stores and economic deprivation often go hand in hand. Unlike the Midwest, where LILA doesn\u2019t always translate to food insecurity, the alignment in the West suggests that isolation compounds other structural barriers to access.<\/p>\n<h2><a name=\"jump\"><\/a>Methodology<\/h2>\n<p>To produce this analysis, we evaluated national and state-level data across seven interrelated categories to better understand the conditions that define food deserts in America.<\/p>\n<p>We began with the USDA\u2019s classification of low-income, low-access tracts (LILA) to identify areas considered food deserts.<sup>1<\/sup> This measure formed the backbone of our analysis, reflecting geographic and economic barriers to grocery store access. For each state, we calculated the deviation of the population living in LILA tracts compared to the national average.<\/p>\n<p>Next, we pulled data on food insecurity rates and the percentage of households qualifying for food assistance, using data from Feeding America\u2019s Map the Meal Gap project.<sup>2<\/sup> These measures were used to capture household-level hardship and compare it with broader geographic indicators like LILA.<\/p>\n<p>To assess the surrounding food environment, we calculated each state\u2019s Retail Food Environment Index (RFEI)\u2014the ratio of fast food and convenience stores to grocery stores and supermarkets\u2014using data from the CDC\u2019s PLACES data library.<sup>3<\/sup> We also incorporated statistics on the share of independently owned restaurants, using data on the share of independent vs. chain restaurants from Friendly Cities Lab at Georgia Tech.<sup>4<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>We then incorporated produce availability scores, derived from the USDA\u2019s Local Food Directories,<sup>5<\/sup> which tracks the presence of fresh fruit and vegetable outlets in each county. Finally, we included health outcome data\u2014specifically the prevalence of obesity and diabetes\u2014again using data from the CDC\u2019s PLACES data library.<sup>3<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>All scores were normalized around 1.0 to reflect how much higher or lower each state was relative to the national average. We computed correlations both at the national level (weighted by population) and at the state level to identify meaningful regional or state-specific deviations.<\/p>\n<p>Note that this analysis relies on available data, and as such may be subject to limitations such as lag effects in health data, skewed results for states with relatively few counties, or uneven reporting between urban and rural areas. Also, it\u2019s important to reiterate that correlation does not imply causation with regard to these findings.<\/p>\n<p>This analysis offers a nuanced picture of food deserts in America. While national trends provide a useful overview into the concept and implications of food deserts in general, perhaps more telling insights come from regional divergence. Ultimately, our findings suggest that the reality of food deserts is far more complex than a simple lack of grocery stores\u2014and that meaningful solutions would require an equally layered understanding of food access, affordability, and community context.<\/p>\n<h2>Sources<\/h2>\n<p><em>(1) U.S. Department of Agriculture, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ers.usda.gov\/data-products\/food-access-research-atlas\/download-the-data\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Food Access Research Atlas<\/a><\/em><br \/>\n<em>(2) Feeding America, <a href=\"https:\/\/map.feedingamerica.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Map the Meal Gap<\/a><\/em><br \/>\n<em>(3) U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, <a href=\"https:\/\/data.cdc.gov\/browse?category=500+Cities+%26+Places&amp;q=2024&amp;sortBy=relevance&amp;tags=places&amp;pageSize=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">PLACES Data Portal<\/a><\/em><br \/>\n<em>(4) Georgia Tech Friendly Cities Lab, <a href=\"https:\/\/friendlycities.gatech.edu\/data-interactive\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Restaurant Chainness<\/a><\/em><br \/>\n<em>(5)United States Department of Agriculture, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usdalocalfoodportal.com\/fe\/datasharing\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Local Food Directories<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\t\n\t<h3 class=\"additional-articles-heading\">LOOKING FOR MORE INSIGHTS INTO THE STATE OF FOOD IN AMERICA? CHECK OUT THESE ANALYSES NEXT!<\/h3>\n\n\t\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/statistics-on-what-americans-are-eating-for-better-health\/\">Health &amp; Wellness Food Trends: Key Statistics on What Americans Are Eating for Better Health<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/americas-most-budget-friendly-states-for-foodies\/\">America\u2019s Most Budget-Friendly States for Foodies<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-waste-in-america\/\">Food Waste in America: Which States Produce the Most Food Waste?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":68723,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1317],"tags":[1389],"class_list":["post-68722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-food-drink","tag-statistics"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S. - Escoffier<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68722\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Escoffier\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-06-26T12:00:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-07-14T15:56:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Food-Deserts-An-Analysis-of-their-Prevalence-in-the-U.S.-social-image.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"630\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sarah Larson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Food-Deserts-An-Analysis-of-their-Prevalence-in-the-U.S.-social-image.webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sarah Larson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"10 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S. - Escoffier","description":"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S.","og_description":"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68722","og_site_name":"Escoffier","article_published_time":"2025-06-26T12:00:35+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-07-14T15:56:28+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":630,"url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Food-Deserts-An-Analysis-of-their-Prevalence-in-the-U.S.-social-image.webp","type":"image\/webp"}],"author":"Sarah Larson","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S.","twitter_description":"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.","twitter_image":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Food-Deserts-An-Analysis-of-their-Prevalence-in-the-U.S.-social-image.webp","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Sarah Larson","Est. reading time":"10 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/","url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/","name":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S. - Escoffier","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Crates-of-fruit-greens-tomatoes-and-other-fresh-produce-arranged-for-sale-at-a-market.-768.webp","datePublished":"2025-06-26T12:00:35+00:00","dateModified":"2025-07-14T15:56:28+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/92865322cd7b69c7d4cb52128fbe6c55"},"description":"America has its share of food deserts \u2013 but just how much does that concept really tell us? We analyzed data on health, access, and more.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Crates-of-fruit-greens-tomatoes-and-other-fresh-produce-arranged-for-sale-at-a-market.-768.webp","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Crates-of-fruit-greens-tomatoes-and-other-fresh-produce-arranged-for-sale-at-a-market.-768.webp","width":768,"height":512,"caption":"Crates of fruit, greens, tomatoes, and other fresh produce arranged for sale at a market."},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/world-food-drink\/food-deserts-an-analysis-of-their-prevalence-in-the-us\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"World of Food &amp; Drink","item":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/category\/world-food-drink\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Food Deserts: An Analysis of their Prevalence in the U.S."}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/","name":"Escoffier","description":"School of Culinary Arts","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/92865322cd7b69c7d4cb52128fbe6c55","name":"Sarah Larson","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8e9866eed1196a169013294476c18dd1213d5a59a7690dac8d34ce2d79bc7b0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f8e9866eed1196a169013294476c18dd1213d5a59a7690dac8d34ce2d79bc7b0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Sarah Larson"},"url":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/blog\/author\/slarson\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68722\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.escoffier.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}