Food Security in Households of Stunting Toddlers in the Meratus Mountains Region HULU Sungai Tengah District, South Kalimantan Province, Indonesia

The occurrence of stunting in toddlers often arises due to vulnerable food security at the household level. Household food security includes food availability, food access, and food diversity related to ecosystem conditions. This research aims to determine family food security in stunted toddlers and its relationship with food availability, food access, and food diversity in the Meratus Mountains of Batang Alai Timur District, Hulu Sungai Tengah Regency, South Kalimantan Province, Indonesia. The methods used are observation, interviews, and recording methods. The research results show that the average energy consumed by toddlers in Hulu Sungai Tengah Regency is 1104.2 kcal/capita/day with an RDA score of 65.4. The food security status of most households is in the food insecure category with a moderate degree of hunger of 70.0%, a degree of severe hunger of 30.0% and there are no households experiencing food security and food insecurity without hunger. Aspects of food availability, two respondents have high food availability, namely 10%, two respondents with moderate food availability, 10%, and the majority have low food availability, 80%. Aspects of food access, 6 respondents have a distance of < 25 minutes to the market, namely 30%, 14 respondents have access to a market with a distance of ≥ 25 minutes to obtain food, 70%. Aspects of food security, there are 20 respondents or all families of children under five who experience food insecurity, namely 100%, there are no respondents who have food safe and food alert status. The composite index shows that there are no respondents or families of children under five who have food secure status, there are only two respondents who have food alert status, namely 10% and the majority of families experience food insecurity, totaling 18 respondents, namely 90%. The correlation coefficient value with stunting is the availability of 0.349, access of 0.488, and diversity of 0.373. So it can be concluded that the relationship between availability, access diversity, and stunting is weak.