Limited national data are available on household food purchasing decisions. Collecting this information will help fill a critical data gap and support research that informs policymaking on key national priorities, including hunger, nutrition assistance policy, health, and obesity.

To better understand what foods Americans’ acquire and have access to, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Economic Research Service (ERS) is sponsoring the FoodAPS study. The first study was conducted in 2012. USDA is now preparing to launch FoodAPS-2 in 2021. Capturing all the food a household acquires over a 7-day period is complex and requires extensive infrastructure to execute successfully.

USDA tapped Westat to test an alternate data collection method that used web-based tools in 2016 and given the positive findings, has subsequently awarded Westat the FoodAPS-2 contract.