| In their duties to protect society's health, safety, and welfare, contemporary planners and policy-makers often overlook food production, distribution, and consumption. Drawing from the theoretical underpinnings of the just sustainability paradigm, this thesis uses the community food security movement as a platform to discuss and identify rural food deserts. While most previous food desert studies have been focused in urban settings and in the United Kingdom, this thesis aims to develop a methodology for food desert identification in rural areas of the United States. Existent methodologies are examined and new criteria are formulated. Four food desert criteria are applied to the rural state of Vermont. Food deserts are identified and presented using Geographical Information Systems software and policy recommendations are provided which include strategies for increasing awareness of the food-related environmental justice and sustainability challenges facing the state among planners, policy-makers, non-profit organizations, and citizens. The author recommends further research in order to encourage the emergence of a streamlined rural-focused food desert identification strategy. |
