There's an underlying problem with the FDA's Food Desert program. The problem is that the USDA constructs its maps based on statistics purchased from the A.C. Neilsen Company. For instance, there...
There's an underlying problem with the FDA's Food Desert program. The problem is that the USDA constructs its maps based on statistics purchased from the A.C. Neilsen Company. For instance, there is a sales metric of $2 million in annuals sales which determines whether a grocery store qualifies as source for fruits and vegetables. Stores identified has have $2 million sales are kept secret argues the USDA because their identity is based on confidential and proprietary sources, i.e. A.C. Neilsen. The model very much depends on what store is deemed a " Supermarket (SM), Superstore (SS) and Large Grocery (LG) " as the mapping necessarily creates areas from the points based on distance.
I tried to recreate their Food Atlas with granularity down to the Census Block, but I could not do so because the USDA would not make available the list of SM, SS and LGs they used in their model for Napa County, California. This is a very dangerous practice -- private industry through A.C. Neilsen starts driving public policy and computer models cannot be duplicated by the public to test its integrity.
There's an underlying problem with the FDA's Food Desert program. The problem is that the USDA constructs its maps based on statistics purchased from the A.C. Neilsen Company. For instance, there is a sales metric of $2 million in annuals sales which determines whether a grocery store qualifies as source for fruits and vegetables. Stores identified has have $2 million sales are kept secret argues the USDA because their identity is based on confidential and proprietary sources, i.e. A.C. Neilsen. The model very much depends on what store is deemed a " Supermarket (SM), Superstore (SS) and Large Grocery (LG) " as the mapping necessarily creates areas from the points based on distance.
I tried to recreate their Food Atlas with granularity down to the Census Block, but I could not do so because the USDA would not make available the list of SM, SS and LGs they used in their model for Napa County, California. This is a very dangerous practice -- private industry through A.C. Neilsen starts driving public policy and computer models cannot be duplicated by the public to test its integrity.
For an interesting web page, see the USDA Food Atlas at: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-access-research-atlas/go-to-the-atlas.aspx