More than coping: The multifaceted benefits that home and wild food procurement provide to food-insecure practitioners in the Northeastern US

Many food-insecure households in high-income countries produce some of their own food through gardening, hunting, fishing, foraging, or raising livestock—activities collectively referred to as home and wild food procurement (HWFP). This study aims to deepen understanding of the roles that diverse HWFP activities play within the broader set of strategies food-insecure households use to keep food on the table. We conducted interviews with 25 participants in two rural states in the northeastern United States, Maine and Vermont. On average, the study participants reported having engaged in 19 of a list of 41 coping behaviors, not including HWFP activities, in the last year. Overall, they described HWFP activities as socially legitimate food sources that provide multifaceted benefits beyond food. For these interviewees, HWFP can be an effective coping strategy for alleviating household food insecurity because it diversifies their food sources and allows for stockpiling non-market abundances. Yet, HWFP should not be mistaken for a coping strategy in the sense of an activity that households undertake only in response to hardship, because participants associated these activities with diverse, positive meanings such as joy, connection, and autonomy. The only negative aspects of HWFP that participants identified were challenges stemming from limited access to key resources needed for successful harvests, such as equipment, skills, and land access. We recommend policies and programs that ensure access to these prerequisites for HWFP success; people experiencing food insecurity should guide these efforts.