Hugo Melgar-Quiñonez

McGill University | McGill · School of Dietetics and Human Nutrition

Background Water security is necessary for good health, nutrition, and wellbeing, but experiences with water have not typically been measured. Given that measurement of experiences with food access, use, acceptability, and reliability (stability) has greatly expanded our ability to promote food security, there is an urgent need to similarly improve...

Various methods have been proposed to analyze national trends of malnutrition and food insecurity; however, these methods often fail to consider regional specificities that drive national food security dynamics. This case study seeks to close this gap through the novel use of participatory causal loop diagrams (CLDs) to analyze the malnutrition cri...

The consensually approved food security definition by the World Food Summit of 1996, incorporates the constant access by all people not only to sufficient food, but also to safe and nutritionally adequate foods that correspond to cultural values and preferences and that allow everyone to meet her or his dietary needs in terms of macro and micronutr...

Abstract Edible insects, such as palm weevil larvae, have been promoted as an alternative source of nutrients in developing countries for their nutritional benefits, cost‐effective rearing, and yearly availability. Unfortunately, consumer acceptance remains a barrier to their utilization. A supplemental palm weevil larvae and tomato paste were deve...

Background Malnutrition and food insecurity might be driven not only by individual factors but also by contextual conditions, such as area-level deprivation or vulnerability. This study aimed to analyze the association between area-level vulnerability and i) household food insecurity and ii) malnutrition in children in Medellin, Colombia, during th...

Remittance, health and well-being

Objectives: The goal of the present study was to evaluate the association between depression and ultra-processed food consumption as risk factors for developing type 2 diabetes (T2D). Design: A prospective community study. Setting: Baseline data (2009 - 2010) from CARTaGENE community health study from Quebec, Canada, was used. Food and drink c...

Water security requires not only sufficient availability of and access to safe and acceptable quality for domestic uses, but also fair distribution within and across populations. However, a key research gap remains in understanding water security inequality and its dynamics, which in turn creates an impediment to tracking progress towards sustainab...

Worldwide, there is currently an increasing demand for an active connection between the generation of innovations and the achievement of their escalation. Between 2015 and 2018 the scaling up of three varieties of yellow potatoes was carried out in Colombia within the framework of the “More Nutritious Potatoes” project, which had results beyond the...

Objectives To evaluate the changes in Household Food Insecurity (HFI) and diet in children pre and post COVID-19 pandemic in a group of children living in an urban area in Querétaro, Mexico. Methods A total of 67 children (mean age = 11 years, range = 9–13 years) participated in this longitudinal study. HFI and diet were measured in-person, before...

Objectives To evaluate the degree of agreement between adolescents’ reported individual food insecurity (FI) with their parents reported household FI. Methods This is a cross-sectional study with 118 adolescents (15.76 ± 1.65 y) and their parents who were recruited from a rural area in Oaxaca (n = 60) and an urban area in Queretaro (n = 58), Mexic...

Objectives Food security (FS) research shows that disadvantaged groups, defined through characteristics such as gender, have less resources, and human and social capital, face more barriers to exercise their rights and are more marginalized. This study aims to determine sources of FS inequities intersecting with gender, measuring their relative sig...

Background In 2016, a Peace Agreement, explicitly addressing the right to food, was signed, marking the end of more than 50 years of armed conflict and the longest war in the Americas. The expectation was that the years to follow would be marked by rapid social and political change, with the potential to improve food security. Objectives (i) Ascer...

Introduction This study estimates the prevalence of food insecurity, mental well-being, and their associations among immigrants and compares the food insecurity–mental well-being associations with nonimmigrants globally and by region. Methods The Gallup World Poll data from 2014 to 2019 were analyzed in 2021. A total of 36,313 immigrants and 705,9...

There is a growing consensus that women's autonomy is positively related to food security. However, the evidence is inconsistent, and the nature of the pathways connecting the two factors remains unclear. Objective To analyze the connection between women's autonomy and food security drawing from the perspective of rural Indigenous women in Nariño,...

Background Evidence has suggested that Irish people are more satisfied with their lives compared with people from other EU countries. Individual, environment, political, and economic factors are among the determinants of life satisfaction. Although food security affects different features of people's lives, little is known about how it affects life...

Objective To examine the association between household food insecurity and overweight, obesity and abdominal obesity in Mexican adults. Design Cross-sectional study. Setting We analysed data from the Mexican Halfway National Health and Nutrition Survey 2016, a nationally representative survey that accounted for rural and urban areas in four regio...

Enquanto crises econômicas desencadeiam o aumento da insegurança alimentar (IA) e da desigualdade de gênero (DG), o apoio social tem mostrado aliviar esses impactos. No entanto, diferentemente de outros choques econômicos, a pandemia de Covid-19 incluiu no cenário de crise o isolamento social. Este estudo utilizou dados de pesquisa transversal cole...

Objective This study aimed to examine in Colombian rural households the association between different severity levels of household food insecurity and the presence of the double burden of malnutrition (SCOWT), defined as the coexistence of a stunted child under five years and an overweight or obese (OWOB) mother. Design A secondary data analysis w...

Objectives To evaluate the relationship between food insecurity, food environment and obesity in school-aged children in Queretaro. Methods In this cross-sectional study, weight, height and body fat % (BF%) were measured in 122 school-aged children (8.1 ± 1.5 y) from an urban area in Queretaro, Mexico. Additionally, household food insecurity was a...

பன்மொழி நிரலாக்கத்துக்காக தற்காலத்தில் பொதுமான மென்பொருள் கருவி ஒன்றும் கிடைக்காது. ஆங்கில சாராத சில நிரல்மொழிகள் உபயோகத்தில் இருந்தாலும், பைத்தான், யாவாக்கிறீட்டை போன்ற ஆங்கில மூலமாக உருவாக்கப்பட்ட பிரபலமான நிரல்மொழிகளுக்காக எந்த பன்மொழி மாற்று இல்லை. இதற்கு நாங்கள் இந்த கட்டுரையில் லஸ்ஸி என்பது உலகத்தின் முதல் பொதுவான பன்மொழி நிரல்மொழி மொழியாக்கம...

Cross-national evidence is lacking on the association between food insecurity and mental health in youth populations, and on state fragility as a social determinant of these experiences. We analysed data from six cycles of the Gallup World Poll (2014-2019), an annual survey that contains multi-item scales of food insecurity, mental health problems...

Water security is a powerful concept that is still in its early days in the field of nutrition. Given the prevalence and severity of water issues and the many interconnections between water and nutrition, we argue that water security deserves attention commensurate with its importance to human nutrition and health. To this end, we first give a brie...

In March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a set of public guidelines for Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) prevention measures that highlighted handwashing, physical distancing, and household cleaning. These health behaviors are severely compromised in parts of the world that lack secure water supplies, particularly in low- and mi...

உலகத்தில் பிரபலமான நிரல்மொழிகள் பெரும்பான்மையாக ஆங்கில மூலமாக எழுதப்பட்டுள்ளன. வேறு இயற்கை மொழிகளில் நிரலாக்கம் செய்யும் முயற்சிகள் பல்வேறு இருந்தாலும், தொழில்முறை சூழல்நிலையில் அவற்றின் பயன்பாடு குறைவு. இந்த கட்டுரையில் லஸ்ஸி (https://லஸ்ஸி.இந்தியா) என்று சட்டகம் மற்றும் மென்பொருள் கருவி முன்வைக்கப்படும். லஸ்ஸியால் எந்த நிரல்மொழி வேண்டுமானாலும், உ...

Food insecurity contributes to various stress-related health problems and previous research found that its association with mental illness is stronger in more affluent countries. We hypothesised that this pattern is a function of relative deprivation whereby the severity of individual food insecurity relative to others in a reference group determin...

உலகத்தில் பிரபலமான நிரல்மொழிகள் பெரும்பான்மையாக ஆங்கில மூலமாக எழுதப்பட்டுள்ளன. வேறு இயற்கை மொழிகளில் நிரலாக்கம் செய்யும் முயற்சிகள் பல்வேறு இருந்தாலும், தொழில்முறை சூழல்நிலையில் அவற்றின் பயன்பாடு குறைவு. இந்த கட்டுரையில் லஸ்ஸி (https://லஸ்ஸி.இந்தியா) என்று சட்டகம் மற்றும் மென்பொருள் கருவி முன்வைக்கப்படும். லஸ்ஸியால் எந்த நிரல்மொழி வேண்டுமானாலும், உ...

Jaa’ Iximulew qsk’ola k’iy rbiyomal chnkikuina nkitzuqa kii’ njelal rwinaqil, naq rumak k’ara’ qslowlo’ kibnona je’ee’ ajtzmeytaq winaq ruk’in meb’iil, chqaa’ qsmajon mutzta rkbal ki way ki yaa’, taq na paj rij rwacha je’ee’ jawra achnaq nqaljina chk’oa k’iy achnaq mrbiyalta rb’non. Taq ntz’at, nuuk’, npa’j rij rwach k’aslemal rxin ujer, alnaq ncho...

Zip file of all code and data needed to reproduce all results and figures presented in this article. Code runs in Python.

Water access is an important global issue that impacts health and wellbeing and has been recognized by the United Nations as a significant area for improvement. Despite some global improvements from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) targets, regions with the most compromised water access are still experiencing significant deficits. Among thos...

Correct modelling of relationships between predators and prey is crucial to ecological and population dynamics models. However, and despite a long-standing competition between ratio and prey-dependent models (and a few alternative intermediate forms) in the literature, most equations currently used to represent such relationships do not meet theore...

Objectives To evaluate the relationship between household food insecurity and food insecurity of the mothers during her childhood with cognitive function in school children in Querétaro. Methods A total of 153 children (6–10 y) of public elementary schools in the municipality of Querétaro participated in a cross-sectional study. Household food ins...

The amount of remittances to developing counties, defined as the flow of monetary and non-monetary goods, has increased globally and has surpassed the amount of money spent on foreign aid in these developing countries. The impact of remittances on households' purchasing power has been studied; however, its link to food security status is yet to be...

All data and Python code required to run the analyses and generate all figures presented in the article. Note that these will require a local installation of Tiko'n itself (not included), which is distributed through GitHub (https://github.com/julienmalard/Tikon) and PyPI (tikon).

Agroecological food web modelling, which models trophic relationships between the species present in agricultural fields, has significant potential uses in the fields of theoretical and practical agroecology, specifically regarding the planning and evaluation of integrated pest management and biocontrol strategies. However, the practical use of suc...

Xkik’üt chïk k’iy taq samäj na’ojil rub’anom kik’ijolem winaqi’ chuwäch meruchajinem kirikilal (MCR), po man e k’iy ta xetz’eton rub’anom rutzilinem chikiwäch ri kiwinaqilil chuqa’ kichab’äl winaqi’ chuwäch ki MCR. | While the impact of gender on food insecurity (FIS) has been documented, there is a lack of studies on the impact of racial and lingu...

The objective of this cross-sectional study was to assess the relationship between food insecurity and depression in the Mexican population. We used data from the 2012 health and nutrition survey (ENSANUT), which is representative of the Mexican population. Food insecurity was determined by the Latin American and Caribbean Food Security Scale (ELCS...

Billions of people globally, living with various degrees of water insecurity, obtain their household and drinking water from diverse sources that can absorb a disproportionate amount of a household's income. In theory, there are income and expenditure thresholds associated with effective mitigation of household water insecurity, but there is little...

Objectives: Food and water insecurity have both been demonstrated as acute and chronic stressors and undermine human health and development. A basic untested proposition is that they chronically coexist, and that household water insecurity is a fundamental driver of household food insecurity. Methods: We provide a preliminary assessment of their...

This study sought to describe the changes in the food security status in Brazil before and during its most recent financial and political crisis, as well as to explore associations between food security and socioeconomic factors during the crisis. This cross-sectional study analyzed data from two different sources: the Brazilian National Household...

Background Global recognition of the need for food security and gender equality is highlighted by the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) numbers two and five respectively, but there is a lack of data on how these issues are associated in the Global South to inform policy. Objective To assess the changes in perceptions of gender inequality (GI) and...

Women are over-represented globally among the food insecure population, yet only recently have analyses on gender differences in perceived life satisfaction (LS) controlled for food insecurity (FI). This research hypothesizes that FI is a strong determinant of low LS and that at the same FI level, women will report lower perceived LS than men. Usin...

Objectives: Food insecurity (FI) is one of the leading health and nutrition issues in Uganda, where it affects 30% of the population of the country. It negatively impacts physical, mental, and social health that in turn affect nutritional requirements. The purpose of this study was therefore to (1) determine the prevalence of FI in Uganda from 201...

Objectives: This study aims to explore the relationships between different types of social support (SS) and food insecurity (FI) and to describe potential differences in these relationships across countries and demographic characteristics. Methods: The 2017 Gallup World Poll (GWP) dataset, comprised of nationally representative samples of adult...

This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of food insecurity and its association with demographic and socioeconomic factors that characterized elderly survey respondents in 48 developed countries. Cross-sectional data came from the Gallup World Poll for the years 2014 to 2017 based on respondents aged ≥60 years (n = 53,556). Food insecurity was a...

Ending hunger and achieving food security is Goal 2 of the Sustainable Development Goals but will be difficult to achieve as many countries experience financial and political shocks. This study assesses changes in the status of food security in Latin America (LA) during the region’s recent economic recession (2014 to 2017). This cross-sectional stu...

This study aims to assess and compare food security and its socio-demographic correlates in 18 Middle East and North African (MENA) countries that fall under the auspices of the World Health Organization Regional Office of the Eastern Mediterranean (EMRO). This cross-sectional study is based on data from the 2016 Gallup World Poll. The study sample...

Background: Although global efforts have resulted in improvements in health and well-being across the world, economic downturns can rapidly undermine achievements in this area. Methods: Using Gallup World Poll data (n = 7,084) this study assessed the changes in health status and well-being before (2009-2013) and during (2015-2017) the current fi...

Introduction A wide range of water-related problems contribute to the global burden of disease. Despite the many plausible consequences for health and well-being, there is no validated tool to measure individual- or household-level water insecurity equivalently across varying cultural and ecological settings. Accordingly, we are developing the Hous...

Una gran parte de la población mundial depende de la agricultura para su subsistencia y, por este motivo, la misma juega un papel importante en la lucha contra la pobreza y la subnutrición. Numerosos estudios han confirmado la importancia de la variedad de cultivos para la seguridad y diversidad alimentaria de pequeños productores; sin embargo, se...

Xkik’üt chïk k’iy taq samäj na’ojil rub’anom kik’ijolem winaqi’ chuwäch meruchajinem kirikilal (MCR), po man e k’iy ta xetz’eton rub’anom rutzilinem chikiwäch ri kiwinaqilil chuqa’ kichab’äl winaqi’ chuwäch ki MCR. | Mientras que se ha documentado el impacto del género hacia la inseguridad alimentaria (ISA), faltan estudios sobre el impacto de disc...

Objective The present study aimed to determine the relationship among food insecurity, social support and mental well-being in sub-Saharan Africa, a region presenting the highest prevalence of severe food insecurity and a critical scarcity of mental health care. Design Food insecurity was measured using the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES)....

Background Food poverty became an issue for many families in Ireland after the economic crash in 2007–08. This country started recovering from the crisis after 2009, and Ireland was ranked among the countries best able to feed their population. Even though economic recovery has begun in Ireland, it will take time for it to reach all families. We ai...

International remittances to developing countries attract increasing attention because of their rise in volume and their impact on the recipient countries. Receiving remittances from outside the country has become a household coping strategy that might reduce poverty, alleviate hunger, promote better diets and increase productive investments. The m...

Objective: To compare the psychometric characteristics of the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) and the grade of similitude or difference among Colombia, Guatemala, and Mexico during three years. Materials and methods: Psychometric comparison using the Rasch model to calculate the relative severity of each item in FIES, INFIT and contrast...

The abstract of my presentation was published in page 32.

Scale development and validation are critical to much of the work in the health, social, and behavioral sciences. However, the constellation of techniques required for scale development and evaluation can be onerous, jargon-filled, unfamiliar, and resource-intensive. Further, it is often not a part of graduate training. Therefore, our goal was to c...

Background: Malnutrition is one of the major contributors to child mortality in Ethiopia. Currently established, child nutrition status is assessed by four anthropometric indicators. However, there are other factors affecting children's anthropometric statuses. Thus, the main objective of this paper is to explore some of the determinants of child...

As participants at the Ecosystem Inception Meeting convened by the Global Dairy Platform and held in Chicago in June 2016, we have identified some concepts as central to the study of food systems science. Following the definition developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization for sustainable diets, the food supply needs to provide foods that ar...

Resumen Fundamentos: Se analiza la experiencia en hogares del Estado de Guanajuato, México, que padecen limitaciones en torno al acceso al agua en calidad y cantidad. Métodos: Se aplicó una encuesta de 17 ítems a 352 hogares (jefas de familia) para medir las experiencias en torno al acceso al agua, además de la seguridad alimentaria, escolaridad y...

Background: We analyze the experience in households in the State of Guanajuato, Mexico that suffer from limitations regarding access to water in quality and quantity. Methods: A survey of 17 items was applied to 352 households (female heads of household) to measure experiences regarding access to water, in addition to food security, schooling and s...

In this paper, we studied Anglophones and Francophones' family meal such as, frequency of family meals, shopping for groceries, selecting foods based on nutrition labels, personal cooking abilities, and types of foods used when preparing meals. We also investigated the association between the amounts of minutes eating meals at home and some socio-d...

Women’s Home-Gardening Decision-Making and Dietary Diversity

System Dynamics (SD) modeling is well adapted to developing participatory environmental models. However, SD models are ill-suited for complex physical (e.g., groundwater) processes, and existing methods to couple them with physically-based models tend to be complex and inflexible. We here present Tinamit, a novel tool to couple SD and physically-ba...

அங்கக வேளாண்மையில் தீமை செய்யும் பூச்சி மேலாண்மை நன்மை செய்யும் பூச்சி மூலமாக செய்யப்பட்டது, ஆனால் பயிர் மற்றும் மண் தரம் மூலமும் பூச்சிகளை கட்டுப்படுத்தலாம். இந்த ஆராய்ச்சியில், அங்கக மற்றும் செயற்கை உரம் இடப்பட்ட வயல்களுக்கு இடையில் உள்ள மண் தரம் வேறுபாடுகளால் தீமை மற்றும் நன்மை செய்யும் பூச்சிகளின் எண்ணிக்கை வேறுபடுமா என்பதை ஆராய்ச்சித் தேடலில்...

இயற்கை வேளாண்மையில் நன்மை செய்யும் பூச்சிகள் முக்கியமானவை என்று நன்றாக தெரியும். ஆனாலும், வேளாண் சூழ்நிலையில் நன்மை-தீமை செய்யும் பூச்சி மற்றும் செடி இடைவிளைவுகளை பற்றி குறைவாக தெரியும். இந்த ஆராய்ச்சியில், இரண்டு கிராமங்களின் இரு வேறுபட்ட வேளாண்மையில் (ஒன்று இயற்கை, மற்றொன்று செயற்கை) என சூழ்நிலை வலைகள் இருக்கும் என்று கண்டு பிடிக்கப்பட்டது. உறுதி...

This study examined associations between main references Anglophone and Francophone men and women refer to when learning healthy eating, and their knowledge of best food habits (KBFH), body mass index (BMI) status, sex, age, education, and household income. Data were obtained from a 2012 Statistics Canada survey (Canadian Community Health Survey: R...