USDA booklets on hunger of poor quality

WASHINGTON, Dec. 29 (UPI) -- Booklets intended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to help relieve hunger and boost nutrition among minorities are of poor quality, a study found.

The USDA sponsored the printing of materials to help poor people improve their skills at alleviating hunger, including signing onto the food-stamp program. But about 40 percent of the eligible population does not request food stamps because of "the lack of information about program eligibility requirements," the study said.

Further, many of the materials could not be understood because they were written at too high a reading level, the study said.

"Among the 27 materials initially identified, 20 were either irrelevant or of low relevance to food security," said the study team at Oklahoma University Health Sciences Center. "Moreover, very few of them were intended for minority populations."

Although many of the nation's poor are African-American, Hispanic, Native American and elderly, the study found that "the materials lacked cultural relevance for special populations," according to study co-author Robert John.

The study appears in the January/February issue of the American Journal of Health Promotion.