10 American Cities That Are Going Hungry

Millions of Americans suffer from hunger today, and even more are unsure whether they'll be able to provide for their families in the future. To paint a clearer picture, nearly one in four American households with children struggled to afford enough food to feed themselves and their families in 2010, according to a recently released report from the Food and Action Research Center (frac.org). FRAC's Food Hardship in America series has recorded more than one million affirmative responses to this simple question: "Have there been times in the past 12 months when you did not have enough money to buy food that you or your family needed?"

Click here for the 10 American Cities That Are Going Hungry Slideshow.

Hardship rates were unnervingly high for households with children, with a 23.4 percent rate of hardship nationally. Those without children had a 15 percent rate, still high.

In 368 of the country's 435 congressional districts, at least one in six households reports children suffering from food hardship, saying that they did not have enough money to buy the food they needed on many occasions in the past 12 months. And 195 of those districts have a food hardship rate of at least one in four for households with children. Of the 100 largest metropolitan statisical areas, 40 had at least one in four households with children struggling with food hardship and all 100 had 15 percent or more of such households positively answering the question at hand. 

More specifically, of the top 25 cities on the list, there are five cities listed in Florida, four cities in California, two in North Carolina (including the top-ranked city, Winston-Salem at 34.8 percent), and the rest scattered between the Eastern and the Southern regions of the country. As the list continues, it's evident that hunger, though nationwide, is much more prevalent in certain pockets of the country, which begs the question — what is not being done in these states (food stamp programs, drives, etc.) and what is there left to do?

Find out more by reading The Daily Meal's call to action, 44 Things You Can Do to Fight Hunger in America, or find some inspiration in the unselfish acts of some of your favorite stars in 10 Celebrities Fighting Hunger in America.

This article was originally published on October 24, 2011.