The main objective of this study was to quantify food security at the household level in Tay Yen Tu Nature Reserve, Son Dong district, Bac Giang province. The Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) was used to obtain food insecurity statuses. Households in Tay Yen Tu Nature Reserve were classified into four categories including food security, mild food insecurity, moderate food insecurity, and severe food insecurity with prevalences of 25.28%, 20.8%, 32.5%, and 20.8%, respectively. The relationship between livelihood strategies and household food security (HFS) revealed that diversifying products and sales tended to improve the food security status. Furthermore, using Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Cluster Analysis (CA), the research found that the livelihood strategies of the food security category were based on agricultural and natural forest activities, while those of the food insecurity categories related to commercial forest, off-farm, and other activities. Finally, this research suggested that policy makers should focus on promoting agricultural models in paddy rice, maize, peanut, and livestock production; provide support for poor households cultivating plants that consume less water such as soybean, maize, and peanut; shift traditional cultivation from “cereal-livestock mix” to a model of cash income diversification; and invest in and implement intensive horticultural production and infrastructure development including transportation development, irrigation systems, electricity, and market development.
