Skip to main content

Data & Research

Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity School Food Authority Administration of National School Lunch Program Free and Reduced Price Eligibility Determination

From July to September 2002, FNS reviewed the free and reduced price eligibility determination process (i.e., application, verification, reapplication, meal ticket status) for each of 3,474 applications selected for verification in 14 large school food authorities in the 2001-02 school year. These SFAs enroll nearly one million children, among whom 45 percent were approved for free meals and 7 percent were approved for reduced price meals as of Oct. 31, 2001.

08/01/2003
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity The Extent of Trafficking in The Food Stamp Program: 1999 - 2002

Food stamps are intended for food. When individuals sell their benefits for cash it violates the spirit and intent of the Food Stamp Program as well as the law. This practice, known as trafficking, diverts food stamp benefits away from their purpose. It reduces intended nutritional assistance and undermines public perceptions of the integrity and utility of the program. To combat trafficking, the Food and Nutrition Service conducts undercover investigations of authorized food stores. In addition, the agency has developed powerful new EBT-based administrative tools to identify and sanction traffickers.

07/01/2003
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity A Comparison of WIC Vendor Management Practices in 1991 and 1998

FNS published “The WIC Vendor Management Study, 1998” in July 2001 which examined, in part, the extent to which retail grocers, defined as WIC “vendors” were violating program rules and regulations. The 1998 study is a follow-up to the “WIC Vendor Issues Study, 1991” published by FNS in May 1993. 

05/01/2003
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity Survey of the Public Health Nutrition Workforce 1999-2000

The Association of State and Territorial Public Health Nutrition Directors, with support from a cooperative agreement with USDA, conducted a census of the professional and paraprofessional public health nutrition workforce in the states and territories. ASTPHND has conducted periodic profiles of the public health nutrition workforce since 1985. Members of ASTPHND in their respective states and territories conducted the census reported in this paper during 1999-2000. Prior to this, ASTPHND's last survey was conducted in 1994.

01/02/2003
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity WIC Vendor Management Study - 1998

The purpose of the study was to learn the extent to which retail grocers, defined as "vendors" in the WIC Program, authorized to provide food to WIC participants, were violating program rules and procedures, and to determine which programmatic and/or demographic variables could be associated with vendor violations.

07/01/2001
Resource | Research | Assessing/Improving Operations Study of Direct Certification in the National School Lunch Program

The NSLP offers free and reduced-price school meals to students from eligible households. Households with incomes at or below 130 percent of poverty are eligible for free meals, and households with incomes between 131 percent and 185 percent of poverty are eligible for reduced-price meals. Traditionally, to receive these benefits, households had to complete and submit application forms to schools or be directly certified. Direct certification, on the other hand, is a method of eligibility determination that does not require families to complete school meal applications. Instead, school officials use documentation from the local or state welfare agency that indicates that a household participates in AFDC or food stamps as the basis for certifying students for free school meals.

09/01/2000
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity The Extent of Trafficking in the Food Stamp Program: An Update

This report duplicates the precise methodology of the earlier analysis with more than 10,000 new investigations to generate an estimate for the 1996 - 1998 calendar year period.

03/01/2000
Resource | Research | Payment Accuracy and Program Integrity Food Stamp EBT Systems and Program- Eligible vs. Non-Eligible Food Items: Report to Congress

This report explores the feasibility and potential cost of enabling EBT systems to differentiate between program-eligible and ineligible items. It considers the cost of upgrading systems in stores that now have scanners and the cost of installing new systems in stores without scanners. The report also examines the potential for the purchase of ineligible items even with the introduction of new technological controls.

08/01/1998
Resource | Research | Assessing/Improving Operations Evaluation of Food Retailer Compliance Management Demonstrations in EBT Ready States and Related Initiatives

This study evaluates the Retailer Compliance Management Demonstrations in EBT-ready States. In these demonstrations, the State food stamp agencies in New Mexico (NM) and South Carolina (SC) assumed responsibility for managing the participation of food retailers in the FSP, a task previously managed exclusively by the federal government.

04/01/1997
Resource | Research | Assessing/Improving Operations Evaluation of Food Retailer Compliance Management Demonstrations in EBT-Ready States and Related Initiatives: Summary of Study of State Law Enforcement Agreements

The report is based on a telephone survey of all states with SLEB agreements and case studies of 6 states with noteworthy levels of SLEB agreement-generated activity.

09/01/1996
Page updated: May 28, 2024