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Welcome to the Food Desert Website

Feeling hungry? No proper food in the house? Can't face that trek to the shops? Tempted by a burger and some chips from the local takeaway, or a chocolate bar, but it's not really healthy, is it? You may be living in a food desert. The food desert website tells you all about food deserts, why they affect everybody, the links to globalisation and social exclusion, and how the effects of food deserts may be alleviated or eliminated.

New book on Food Deserts now available! The Consuming Geographies of Food: Diet, Food Deserts and Obesity - the only book explicating the food desert phenomenon, how food deserts originated, why they exist, how they can be alleviated, links to obesity, the implications for global food security – available at all good bookshops from May 2014

Full Book Description and Voucher Here

Coming end - 2016 Future Food Systems: An Ethical and Regulatory Perspective – explicating the issue of Supermarkets and Corporate Social Responsibility in the food chain

Coming soon – report on Food Justice, Obesity and Austerity in Cardiff and the Welsh Valleys, funded by CURA (Centre for Urban Research on Austerity)

For an initial summary of the research results click here

More on CURA at http://www.dmu.ac.uk/research/research-faculties-and-institutes/business-and-law/centre-for-urban-research-on-austerity/centre-for-urban-research-on-austerity.aspx

Click here to see how many people have visited this site, by country, annual figures from 1 December 2008

Click here to access papers requested via crit-geog forum.

©Shaw Food Solutions 2003 - 2015. The material on this site is open access and may be freely cited, so long as www.fooddeserts.org is acknowledged as the source.

To help this website become more informative and useful for the community, please email any information or links you feel it might be useful include to hillshaw@aol.com – for example food retail information, historical dates, economic data etc.

Click here to see our consultancy and mapping services

Part 1 - Food Deserts and Obesity

Try out our new Food Desert Finder ©2015. Click here for the map (at present covers Wales and Midlands – to be extended soon). This map shows which areas, by distance, are Food Oases (500 metres from a fruit and vegetable shop), which are Food Savannahs (500 – 1,000 metres) and which are food deserts (over 1,000 metres from a fruit and vegetable shop).

What is a food desert	How did food deserts develop
Where are the food deserts	Measuring Food Deserts

Obesity map of London – extract for Hampstead to Lea Valley. This map shows % obesity levels for 12-year-olds in 2011/12 at the MLSOA level. MLSOAs (see www.neighbourhood.statistics.gov.uk) are census areas with population ca. 7,000. Note the strong association between low obesity in prosperous areas (Hampstead) and higher obesity in more deprived areas (Lea Valley). Also note the higher levels of obesity in London compared to England, despite London’s overall wealth. The whole of England and Wales is being mapped at this level giving a very detailed picture of local obesity levels. Also coming soon, socio-demographic maps of England and Wales at the MLSOA level.

Obesity levels worldwide

For medical effects of obesity, see The Consuming Geographies of Food: Diet, Food Deserts and Obesity, H Shaw, Routledge 2014

Part 2 - Food Retailing (back to top)

UK supermarket sales and profits	UK Supermarket market share
Tesco history	Non-Tesco history
Current issues (supermarkets)
Small food retailers	Post Offices

Non UK retailing, supermarkets and small shops, brief history of selected retailers

European countries

Asia, Africa, and the Americas

Part 3 - food retailing maps, UK (back to top)

Click here for INDEX MAP of UK, key to map numbers below.

					006	007	008	009	010
011			014	015	016	017	018		020
			024	025	026	027		029	030
031	032	033	034	035		037	038	039	040
041	042			045	046	047	048	049	050
051		053	054	055		057	058	059
									070


091	092				096	097	098
	102	103	104

Click here for INDEX MAP of EUROPE, list of maps linked below.

Copenhagen	Utrecht	Brussels	Wiesbaden	Paris
Nantes	Cevennes

Key to maps; map symbols this links to a page explaining in more detail the map symbols shown on the maps. For supermarket codes see supermarket code list

Part 4 –World Socio-Demographic Data Maps (back to top)

Click here for index page linking to world socio-demographic maps – find out which country had TV first? Which country has caught up most with America’s GDP? Which country locks up the most people? Where are the world’s underground metro systems? And much more......

Part 5a Historical Events by date (back to top) (100pp)

1 Jan 2000 - now	I Jan 1980 – 31 Dec 1999	1 Jan 1970 – 31 Dec 1979
1 Jan 1950 – 31 Dec 1969	1 Jan 1930 – 31 Dec 1949
1 Jan 1920 – 31 Dec 1929	1 Jan 1900 – 31 Dec 1919	1 Jan 1860 - 31 Dec 1899
I Jan 1800 – 31 Dec 1859	1 Jan 1600 – 31 Dec 1799	Up to 31 Dec 1599

Part 5b Historical Events by subject (back to top) (60pp)

Afghanistan	Africa
Antarctica	Argentina
Australia	Bangladesh
Belgium	Brazil
Canada	China
Cyprus	Denmark
Eastern Europe	Egypt
EU & International Agencies	Finland
France & Germany to 31 Dec 1869	France & Germany from 1 Jan 1870
Great Britain to 31 January 1901	Great Britain from 1 February 1901
	London
Greece	Iceland
India	Iran
Ireland	Israel
Italy	Japan
Korea	Luxembourg
Malta	Mongolia
Netherlands	New Zealand
Norway	Pakistan
Poland	Portugal
Roman Empire	Russia/USSR
South Africa	South & Central America
South East Asia	Spain
Sweden	Switzerland
Turkey	USA

Economy & Prices	Education & Child	Food
Morals & Punishment	Racial Equality	Sport, Arts, Communications
Women’s Rights

Aviation	Canal & Sea	Railways
Road Traffic

					006	007	008	009	010
011			014	015	016	017	018		020
			024	025	026	027		029	030
031	032	033	034	035		037	038	039	040
041	042			045	046	047	048	049	050
051		053	054	055		057	058	059
									070


091	092				096	097	098
	102	103	104

					006	007	008	009	010
011			014	015	016	017	018		020
			024	025	026	027		029	030
031	032	033	034	035		037	038	039	040
041	042			045	046	047	048	049	050
051		053	054	055		057	058	059
									070


091	092				096	097	098
	102	103	104

					006	007	008	009	010
011			014	015	016	017	018		020
			024	025	026	027		029	030
031	032	033	034	035		037	038	039	040
041	042			045	046	047	048	049	050
051		053	054	055		057	058	059
									070


091	092				096	097	098
	102	103	104