Duration: 10/01/2024 to 09/30/2029

Administrative Advisor(s):

NIFA Reps:

Non-Technical Summary

Low-income Americans spend less on fruits and vegetables and have higher rates of obesity and diet-related diseases than higher-income Americans. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) provides benefits to almost 13% of US households. Policies have been proposed to incentivize healthy eating among SNAP participants. This project will investigate all aspects of SNAP nutrition incentive policies, such as program design and impact. Researchers from different institutions and different fields are investigating SNAP nutrition incentive programs, and there is a need to improve the flow of information between disparate institutions, projects, and disciplines. The target audiences for this project are policymakers, other researchers, and the public. These audiences will learn about the best ways to incentivize healthier diets. Activities undertaken under this project will include investigations of outcomes or methods from past, current, or future SNAP nutrition incentive projects.

Statement of Issues and Justification

The need as indicated by stakeholders

Almost 13% of households in the United States (US) participated in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in 2021 (USDA, 2023). While SNAP has been shown to improve food security (Carlson & Keith-Kennings, 2018), low-income Americans, including SNAP participants, spend less on fruits and vegetables (Blisard, Stewart, & Jolliffe, 2004) and have higher rates of obesity and diet-related diseases than higher-income Americans (Khullar and Chokshi, 2018). To encourage SNAP participants to purchase healthier foods, policies have been proposed to either restrict SNAP benefits to healthier foods or to provide incentives to purchase healthier foods (Harnack et al., 2016). Current policy has focused on incentives, with the implementation of federal programs such as the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP) and the Healthy Fluid Milk Incentives (HFMI) program, as well as local initiatives such as North Carolina’s Healthy Opportunity Pilots program. Funding for these SNAP nutrition incentive programs has totaled well over $100 million from the federal government alone.

The importance of the work

Current research on incentives operating in conjunction with the SNAP program has focused on associations between program participation and fruit and vegetable consumption (e.g. Olsho et al. 2016; Rummo et al. 2019). Some work also has looked at barriers to accessing these incentive programs (e.g. Garner et al. 2020). The effectiveness of these incentive programs depends on how consumers interact with them, and a great deal is not known about consumer responses to individual programs. Even less is known about how SNAP consumers react to different modalities of offering incentives, and benefits and drawbacks of varying programmatic choices. Comparing modalities and programmatic choices involve working across incentive projects.

Though the effectiveness and success of these SNAP nutrition incentive programs depend on creating cross-project and cross-institution knowledge, current research on SNAP nutrition incentive programs is largely siloed, happening on a project-specific basis by researchers. In addition, SNAP nutrition incentive researchers often come from different fields. Some SNAP nutrition incentive researchers are nutrition and public health professionals, while others are economists or agricultural economists. Beyond having different approaches to research, each discipline has its own annual conferences and journals, constraining collaboration and sharing of ideas. Different conferences make it difficult for economists doing research into SNAP nutrition incentive programs to learn from nutrition and public health professionals, and vice versa. Thus, there is a need for greater cross-project and cross-field collaboration among SNAP nutrition incentive researchers. Without a multistate effort, research will remain siloed and less will be known about effects of these SNAP nutrition incentive programs and how to maximize their impact.

In response to the need for a broader effort, and to facilitate cross-project and cross-field learning, Auburn University’s Hunger Solutions Institute (HSI) convened an in-person conference for researchers leading projects investigating SNAP nutrition incentive programs Funded by a USDA conference grant (USDA GRANT # G00016950), the conference convened researchers working on GusNIP projects – either formally using their roles as evaluators or less formally as collaborators – and researchers working on HFMI and other local SNAP nutrition incentive programs. Researchers from a variety of fields were invited to participate, including nutrition, public health, and agricultural economics. Seventeen researchers attended to present current research projects and discuss collaboration. Additionally, many others who were invited but could not come expressed interest in attending such a workshop and collaborating in the future. Of the researchers who attended, many left positive feedback and expressed interest in attending the workshop yearly or biennially. Attendees also communicated the need for more opportunities to network and collaborate on future SNAP nutrition incentive projects.

Technical feasibility of the research

Current research on SNAP nutrition incentive programs uses an array of qualitative and quantitative research methods. This project will use appropriate statistical and other methods to analyze data generated.

Advantages of doing the work as a multistate effort

The multistate effort will enable researchers across disciplines and institutions to collaborate and learn from each other. We anticipate participants from the disciplines of agricultural economics, nutrition, public health, and other relevant disciplines. In addition, we anticipate participants to include researchers working as university faculty members, postdoctoral researchers, predoctoral researchers, and Extension staff. Participants will likely be from land grant institutions and other state universities, historically black colleges and universities, private universities, and other entities such as food retailers and nongovernmental organizations.

Likely impacts

Research developed through this multistate project will 1) measure the relationship between SNAP incentive program participation and individual/household outcomes, 2) measure how different programmatic decisions impact household participation and the effectiveness and efficiency of the program, and 3) measure how nutrition incentive programs impact food retailers, agribusiness entities, and farmers. These findings will be used by a number of different stakeholders. Retailers and nongovernmental organizations implementing incentive programs will learn best practices and be able to better serve SNAP households. Understanding who does and does not use SNAP nutrition incentive programs will make outreach efforts by community members more effective. Understanding how these programs impact retailers, agribusiness, and farmers will enable policy stakeholders to appropriately decide funding allocations for SNAP nutrition incentive programs. Grant administrators in the government will be able to better design the parameters of future funding calls for SNAP nutrition incentive programs. Research on SNAP incentive programs will thus provide insight into ways to improve diets among a large portion of the U.S. population, and this understanding can in turn inform improvements in U.S. diets for everyone.

Related, Current and Previous Work

Only two active multistate Hatch projects are related to understanding and incentivizing healthier diets. NC1193 aims to help communities improve the health of young adults, and NC3169 investigates the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program. No current multistate Hatch proposals bring together researchers who investigate incentives for healthier eating among SNAP households.

Outside of Hatch projects, the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP) Training, Technical Assistance, Evaluation, and Information Center (NTAE) has a community of practice for evaluators of GusNIP projects. This multistate Hatch project will build on this community by providing a researcher-led space that conducts research on GusNIP and other SNAP nutrition incentive projects.

Objectives

1. Evaluate the impact of SNAP nutrition incentives on spending patterns, diet, heath, and well-being.
   
2. Investigate benefits and drawbacks from different SNAP nutrition incentive program modalities and programmatic designs.
   
3. Assess the role of local agriculture, businesses, and retailers in providing SNAP nutrition incentives.
   

Methods

Research toward our three research objectives will use qualitative and quantitative data with appropriate methods. Qualitative data will be from incentive program participants and other relevant samples. Quantitative data will come from both primary and secondary sources. Primary data will be collected from program participants and non-participants using online forms as well as in-person survey data collection. Secondary data sources will include community sociodemographic information from sources such as the US Census Bureau. In addition, this project will use detailed point-of-sale data from retailers. Quantitative data will be analyzed using statistical methods that both document use of SNAP nutrition incentives as well as seek to establish causal relationships.

Measurement of Progress and Results

Outputs

• Presentations at professional meetings or to stakeholders Comments: We will present preliminary and final research results at appropriate professional meetings, for example the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management. In addition, we will present findings to government, industry, and public stakeholders.
• Papers in academic journals Comments: We will publish papers in academic journals across a range of disciplines. These may include journals in agricultural economics such as Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, journals in nutrition such the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, and journals in public health such as American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
• Datasets Comments: Research from this project will generate numerous qualitative and quantitative datasets. As appropriate, we will seek to make these data publicly available through repositories such as Auburn University's AUrora.

Outcomes or Projected Impacts

• Improved coordination of research activities among SNAP nutrition incentive programs and across fields
• Measurement of correlations and impacts of participation in SNAP nutrition incentive programs.
• Identification of tradeoffs from different SNAP nutrition incentive program design choices.
• Greater understanding of how SNAP nutrition incentive programs fit into retailer, business, and agricultural stakeholder strategy.

Milestones

(2026):(2026): To develop multiyear research activities, an inaugural meeting of this project will occur in late 2026. This meeting will enable networking and help working groups and research projects to form across institutions and disciplines.

Projected Participation

View Appendix E: Participation

Outreach Plan

The project will plan, coordinate, and offer workshops for researchers involved in SNAP nutrition incentive program research but not part of this multistate Hatch project. In addition, the project will generate refereed journal articles. Project members will present preliminary and final results at professional meetings and to stakeholders. As appropriate, presentation materials will be made publicly available.

Organization/Governance

Members will elect a Chair, Co-Chair, and Secretary, each of which will serve for two years. Elections will be held at the annual meeting for the project, which will occur at a time and place agreeable to the membership. Individual working groups may be formed as sub-topics emerge. The leadership team is responsible for planning and conducting the annual meeting as well as preparing and submitting the annual report.

Literature Cited

Blisard, Noel, Hayden Stewart, and Dean Jolliffee. 2004. Low-income households’ expenditures on fruits and vegetables. USDA, Agricultural Economic Report Number 833.

Carlson, Steven, and Brynne Keith-Jennings. 2018. SNAP is linked with improved nutritional outcomes and lower health care costs. Washington, DC: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Report January 17, 2018.

Garner JA, Coombs C, Savoie-Roskos M, Durward C, Seguin-Fowler R. A qualitative evaluation of Double Up Food Bucks farmers’ market incentive program access. J Nutr Educ Behav. 2020;52:705-712.

Harnack, Lisa, J. Michael Oakes, Brian Elbel, Timothy Beatty, Sarah Rydell, and Simone French. 2016. Effects of subsidies and prohibitions on nutrition in a food benefit program: A randomized clinical trial. JAMA Internal Medicine 176(11): 1610-1618.

Kullar, Dhruv, and Dave A. Chokshi. 2018. Health, income, & poverty: where we are & what could help. Health Affairs. Health Policy Brief, October 4, 2018.

Olsho LEW, Klerman J, Wilde PE, Bartlett S. Financial incentives increase fruit and vegetable intake among Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program participants: a randomized controlled trial of the USDA Healthy Incentives Pilot. Am J Clin Nutr 2016;104:423-435.

Rummo PE, Noriega D, Parret A, Harding M, Hesterman O, Elbel B. Evaluating a USDA program that gives SNAP participants financial incentives to buy fresh produce in supermarkets. Health Aff (Millwood). 2019;38(11):1816-1823.

Attachments

Land Grant Participating States/Institutions

Non Land Grant Participating States/Institutions