P78 Expanded Food & Nutrition Education Program Building Household Food Resilience Among Low-Income Families

Srivastava, Deepa

To improve nutrition and food resource management practices and household food security among low-income families. Efforts to strengthen nutrition and food security is needed to build household food resilience (ie, being resourceful) more than ever as low-income families face unprecedented challenges due to the COVID pandemic. The rising food insecurity in California is concerning, which is linked to poor dietary outcomes and obesity. Parents recruited from low-income community settings in Tulare County, California. During FY2019-20, trained bilingual nutrition educator implemented the 9-week Expanded Food & Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) in English and Spanish using series-based adult curriculum Eating Smart Being Active. Each class was held once a week for 60-90 minutes in duration. Participants completed demographics questionnaire, Food Tracker dietary recall, and a pre-post Food & Physical Activity Questionnaire (FPAQ). Descriptive and Pre-Post analyses were completed using WebNEERS reporting tool. Of the total 149 program families reached, 136 participants who attended all the lessons graduated with a certificate. Majority of the participants were Hispanic. Differences in change from pre-to-post indicated improvements in all the program areas. Of the 136 graduates, 88% of participants showed improvement in 1 or more food resource management practices, 92% showed improvements in 1 or more diet quality/ nutrition practices, 88% showed improvements in 1 or more food safety practices, and 91% showed improvements in 1 or more physical activity behaviors. A noteworthy program impact was a random sample (n = 19) of these participants reported saving an average of $44.50 on food per month. The EFNEP program empower families to build household food resilience with knowledge and skills to adopt healthy practices in the areas of food resource management, food security, nutrition/physical activity, and food safety. USDA NIFA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Journal of Nutrition Education & Behavior is the property of Elsevier B.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)