HCI Report: Analysis of Food Poverty in the UK and ICT Solutions

This report delves into the issue of food poverty in the UK, employing a human-computer interaction (HCI) perspective. It begins by analyzing the problem through a rich picture, illustrating various factors contributing to food insecurity. The report then explores how information and communication technologies (ICT) can be leveraged to combat food poverty, focusing on applications in agriculture, data monitoring, and communication. A design fiction scenario is presented to showcase the potential of ICT solutions. The report concludes with a critical reflection on the proposed solutions and their implications. The analysis covers topics such as agricultural practices, water management, government policies, and the role of technology in improving food access and security for vulnerable populations. The report highlights the potential of ICT tools, including remote sensing, mobile applications, and geographic information systems, to improve food production, distribution, and access, ultimately aiming to reduce the prevalence of food poverty in the UK.

Running head: HUMAN COMPUTER INTERACTION
HUMAN COMPUTER INTERACTION
Name of student
Name of university
Author’s note:

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Table of Contents
Introduction....................................................................................................................2
Part A.............................................................................................................................2
Rich picture................................................................................................................2
Description of rich picture.........................................................................................3
Part B..............................................................................................................................7
Design fiction.............................................................................................................7
Description of the design fiction................................................................................9
Critical reflection.......................................................................................................9
Conclusion....................................................................................................................10
References....................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
Food scarcity or insecurity of domestic food could be produced by the shortage in the
funding or any particular circumstances, but it might be long-time experience of not having
the ability of accessing any healthy diet or even afford of eating properly. This report intends
to analyse the food poverty in UK by developing rich picture of the situation. A brief rich
picture along with the discussion of the situation has been provided in this report. A design
fiction of poverty situation has been briefly stated in this report that describes how ICT could
be used in relation to the use of the digital technology. The report discusses food security
term in the relation of sufficient availability of food supplies as well as the access to food
supply.
Part A
Rich picture
Figure 1: Rich picture

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Source: (Created by author)
Description of rich picture
The aspects of food poverty has been illustrated in this rich picture.
1. O'Connell, R., Owen, C., Padley, M., Simon, A. and Brannen, J., 2019. Which types
of family are at risk of food poverty in the UK? A relative deprivation
approach. Social Policy and Society, 18(1), pp.1-18.
The improper agricultural and the water management system is presently becoming
the major issue in UK. The unavailability of proper water management system and the
agricultural system leads to the unavailability of the adequate amount of food and water. Due
to the unavailability of proper food and proper water in the country, the people of the
company are suffering significantly. The health of the people is extensively affected due to
improper food and water availability. The people are reporting this issue to the government
for the implementation of appropriate measures to eradicate the unavailability of food. The
government is presently providing appropriate funds to the governing bodies for
implementing the appropriate measures.
2. Knight, A., O'Connell, R. and Brannen, J., 2018. Eating with friends, family or not at
all: young people's experiences of food poverty in the UK. Children & Society, 32(3),
pp.185-194.
The aspect of food poverty involves various negative impacts on the well-being as
well as the health of individuals. It is crucial that the assurance is provided to the people
regarding the availability of proper diet in any socially satisfactory manner and have the
adequate conviction regarding the methods by which the healthy diet would be secured by the
individuals as well as their households.

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3. McEachern, M., Moraes, C., Gibbons, A. and Scullion, L., 2020. Research brief
update: Understanding food poverty and the transitional behaviour of vulnerable
individuals: Research brief update.
Around January 2019, a report was published by the Environmental Audit Committee
regarding the supportable development goals around UK and the monitoring on laws. The
main discovery of the report was that:
 The aspect of food insecurity has been considered to be substantial and even
growing in UK with the levels that are worst among Europe, specifically for the
children.
 The government is unable to recognise as well as the respond appropriately and
has permitted the issues to be analysed and determine the solutions (McEachern et
al. 2020)
 The obesity strategy of the government is completely silent on the issue of the
food insecurity
 The minister for Hunger is required to be implemented for ensuring that cross-
departmental actions
4. Beacom, E., Furey, S., Hollywood, L. and Humphreys, P., 2018, March. Perspectives
on food poverty definition and measurement in Northern Ireland. In Multi-
disciplinary research conference on food and poverty in the UK: Taking stock,
moving forward (pp. 27-28).
It has been determined that the introduction of the ICT tools and methods would be
helpful for tackling the problem of food poverty within UK and any other country (Beacom et

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al. 2018). The famine as well as the aspect of hunger have been constantly plaguing mankind
all through history and it remains to be among the critical problems.
5. McClelland, N., Furey, S., McKenzie, P. and Hollywood, L., 2018, March. Rural
poverty: The impact of rurality on consumers’ access to food services, using a food
poverty risk index. In Multi-disciplinary research conference on food and poverty in
the UK: Taking stock, moving forward (pp. 39-39).
In the recent times, extensive attention is being implemented on the issue of the food
security, which became one of crucial issue on worldwide agenda (McClelland et al. 2018).
The worries over the food security are being encouraged by the impact of the climate
changes, severe rise in the prices of food in several countries and the energy policies,
specifically on the problem of biofuels.
The implementation of proper methods of food security is particularly helpful in
ensuring that the countries do not face the issue of food poverty. The solution for eliminating
food poverty in UK is the proper use of the ICT tools and methods. ICT has been considered
as the basic need for providing the farmers with the vital information regarding the weather
reports and the crop prices. It would be helpful in educating them regarding the new
techniques of farming (McEachern et al. 2020). Radio broadcasting has been considered to be
the crucial medium for communicating with the farmers, specifically because it is
inexpensive and covers vast areas in the developing world.
6. McClelland, N., Furey, S., McKenzie, P. and Hollywood, L., 2018, March. Rural
poverty: The impact of rurality on consumers’ access to food services, using a food
poverty risk index. In Multi-disciplinary research conference on food and poverty in
the UK: Taking stock, moving forward (pp. 39-39).

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The radio is significantly service directed in the developing countries and it features
the food channel with programs providing accurate advice on the methods of improving
productivity. Due to the swift increase in the use of mobile phone in the developing countries,
it has grown to be the most effective method of disseminating information. With the
introduction of SMS, the fishers as well as the farmers could gain information directly on the
phones. The accurate monitoring of the food supplies all around the world is the initial and
vital stage in addressing the food security. It includes the mapping of agricultural production
as well as the food shortages along with establishing the comprehensive database. Monitoring
the agricultural fields could be effectively done with the help of ICT by using:
Remote sensing infrastructure: The monitoring of the agricultural as well as water
assets by utilisation of the high quality radiometers and the moderate quality imaging
spectrometers, commonly placed in the abroad aircrafts as well as the satellites.
ICT equipment: Various hardware and software applications are presently utilised for
the analysis of food security, that includes various statistics, mapping and modelling.
Specifically, the geographic information systems could assist in establishing the cross-
sectoral communication by offering the adequate tools for the storage as well as enquiry of
the statistical data, and then incorporating the database of various sources in similar format,
map projection and structure.
Communication infrastructure: The associated information could be disseminated
through the internet along with other channels of communication to the consumers and
farmers and could be represented on the web portals, and communicating maps. UK could
introduce the various ICT tools for coordinating and for rapidly offering the food sources in
any emergency circumstances as well as the crises affecting the basic availability to food.
The food poverty issue could be tackled by offering inter-agency telecommunications

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services and infrastructure for both the security and data communications. The country could
eliminate the issue of food poverty by offering the standard, interoperable ICT platforms as
well as the processes for avoiding any kind of duplication and guarantee the cost efficient
services and also guarantee the easy transition to the post-emergency reconstruction.
Monitoring the agricultural conditions over the country could help in eliminating the issue of
present food poverty. Monitoring the soil conditions as well as the environmental conditions
could make the farming increasingly profitable and extensively sustainable, for example, with
the help of improved water management plus disease control. The enhanced operation as well
as the water management for the irrigation purposes could lead to the substantial savings and
for an increasingly sustainable utilisation of the water resources and improved soil
productivity. The ICT tools in the soil monitoring and agricultural includes:
Stand-alone sensors, that helps in monitoring air temperature, humidity and
atmospheric pressure
USN or Ubiquitous sensor networks, where the sensor nodes have been implemented
on field and the data is being transferred to the base. This particular data could be uploaded to
the global systems
Telemetry units that that transmits air temperature, data of leaf dampness, humidity,
wind speed, soil moisture, solar radiation, through the cellular networks.
Part B
Design fiction
ICTs is presently described as the combined word that involves the communication
equipment or application, including cellular phones, radio, television, network and computer
hardware along with the software satellite systems. ICT plays the crucial role by effectively
by connecting the users to updated information, market and the skills. The ICTs provides

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unprecedented information regarding the storage, and capacity and also increases in the
power of processing along with speed integrated with the dramatic reduction of costs.
Cellular phone has offered links with the market for the farmers. In the agricultural sector, the
mobile phones has reduced the transaction costs, increased the range by trade network and
allowed the searches for employment. The introduction of the mobile phones has led to the
revolutionisation of the manner by which the farmers gain exchange as well as manipulate
information as it has led to the manner by which interaction among the farmers is being done
with the markets and the cities. The data gained from the sensors could be analysed with the
help of decision support systems for predicting the most appropriate methods of ensuring that
the productivity is high. The food poverty in UK could be eliminated by the proper utilisation
of the ICT technologies for ensuring that the production from the agricultural sector is
adequate. The geographic information system is being extensively utilised in the sector of
agriculture specifically in the precision farming. The mapping of the land is done digitally
and then the relevant geodetic data such as the topography and the contours have been
integrated with the various statistical data to execute the easy analysis of the soil in the fields.
The GIS is being used for the decision making to help in determining what to plant as well as
where to plant using the historical data and the sampling. The device used for monitoring is
laptop or computer. The suggested system primarily analyses the soil moisture as well as the
need of adequate water for the crops. The proper water management system is needed for
supplying the correct amount of water for maintaining the level of moisture. Microcontroller
has been used for controlling the operation with the help of relay switch as well as pump. The
suggested system mainly uses the sensor note that involves the IEEE 802.15.4/zigbee
wireless microcontroller plus the JN5121 module. The GPRS gateway has been used for the
data transmission over significantly long distance. The mobile unit could be used as the
monitoring device. The suggested system utilises the zigbee wireless microcontroller sensor

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network in the agricultural sector. The energy efficient WSN for the agricultural sector
utilises the sensor node equipment along with the CC1110 system on chip with significantly
low power RF Trans receiver as well as the 8051 MCU.
Description of the design fiction
The suggested system follows the various tools as well as the methods of ICT and
helps in eliminating the issue of food poverty. In the rich picture, it has been illustrated that
the people of UK are not gaining the adequate food and major sections of the population are
facing this particular issue. The scarcity in the food is mainly happening because of the
improper management of the agricultural sector. Without the proper technologies and tools,
the agricultural sector is not able to produce adequate goods. With the introduction of the
suggested irrigation management system in the agricultural sector, the main issue of lack of
determining the adequate amount of water in the fields could be eliminated. It has been
illustrated in the rich picture that the introduction of the ICT tools in the agricultural sector
helps in ensuring that monitoring of the various aspects in the field is done properly. The
dissemination of the sufficient, tailored and efficient technologies associated with the agro-
climatic zone, size of the farm as well as the type of soil to the farmers is presently deficient
in the UK agricultural sector. The decision support system in the sector could help in the
farmers by keeping them updated regarding the present information regarding the weather,
agriculture, innovative varieties of the crops as well as the innovative methods of increasing
production along with quality control. The suggested ICT design could broadcast the
authentic and precise information at appropriate time for the farmers and allow them to utilise
the system and gain major benefits. The introduction of the decision support system using
ICT allows the farmers in planning the kind of crops, practise the appropriate agricultural
methods for the harvesting, cultivation, post harvesting plus marketing the products for
improved results.

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Critical reflection
HCI could be considered as the interdisciplinary sector that inter-relates with the
various disciplines, for example psychology, cognitive psychology, computer science,
engineering and presently the other disciplines like art science, sociology and the
anthropology (Card 2018). As the concept and as it has been demonstrated via the social
movements, the social justice mainly attends the methods by which the entities experiences
oppression. It involves the methods by which the burdens, benefits, power, obligations,
privilege and the opportunity has been distributed equally within the society (Lazar, Feng and
Hochheiser 2017). The present efforts in the sector of HCI has made crucial movement
towards the implementation of the means for the designers for reflexively posing various
questions regarding the practices and the methods by which it engages the system of
oppression (Hibbeln et al. 2017). The social justice is not followed when the designing of
system has been done on the basis of extensive bias on any one particular section of the
society and not the overall society including various groups (Shneiderman et al. 2016). The
HCI design of the system that is being suggested for solving the issue of improper production
of food in UK follows the rules of social justice and ensures that the complete society is
benefitted from the implementation of the improved irrigation system (Grudin 2017). The
irrigation system could be used by the farmers for monitoring the moisture level of the land
and improve the produce (Haria et al. 2017). The data gained from the sensors implemented
in the system would be analysed through the decision support system that would help in
taking the most appropriate decisions regarding the produce from the fields (Norman 2017).
The design of the improved irrigation system and the decision support system is been done so
that the implementation of the system is done all through the country of UK and all the
people are benefitted (Weyers et al. 2017). The complete system would be managed by the IT
experts and the data generated from the system would be relayed to the farmers for ensuring

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that the real-time data is provided to the farmers (de Aguiar Pereira, Wang and Moutinho
2019).
Conclusion
Therefore, it could be concluded that the design of the improved irrigation system
would help in improving the methods of monitoring the soil moisture level and the quality of
the soil. The water management in the agricultural fields of the country would be improved
significantly. The designing of the system has been done in the proper manner that would
ensure that all the people are able to use it properly. The implementation of proper methods
of food security is particularly helpful in ensuring that the countries do not face the issue of
food poverty. The solution for eliminating food poverty in UK is the proper use of the ICT
tools and methods. ICT has been considered as the basic need for providing the farmers with
the vital information regarding the weather reports and the crop prices. ICTs is presently
described as the combined term that includes the communication devices or application,
including television, cellular phones, radio, network and computer hardware along with the
software satellite systems. ICT plays the crucial role by effectively by connecting the users to
updated information, market and the skills.