A Sobeys grocery store in Lower Sackville, NS, on Dec. 7, 2021. Photo: Yvette d’Entremont
More Nova Scotians are struggling with the rising cost of food, with record numbers turning to Feed Nova Scotia for help.
The non-profit’s executive director Nick Jennery was one of several witnesses who appeared before the provincial public accounts committee on Wednesday to address rising food costs and food inflation in Nova Scotia.
“Thousands of our neighbours, your constituents, were food insecure long before the current rise in food costs, and today’s cost of living has deepened the crisis,” Jennery told committee members.
“问题不仅是食物已经上升了。收入并没有保持步伐。与去年同期相比，2022年第一季度第一次参观了一家食品银行。”
Feed Nova Scotia distributed a record-breaking three million kilograms of food last year, a first in its 38-year history.
“As the urgent need for support continues to rise, so does the expectation that charities like Feed Nova Scotia will continue to meet it. This is simply not sustainable,” Jennery said.
“We need government to tackle the root causes and ensure every Nova Scotian can meet their needs and live a life of dignity and opportunity.”
The hidden hungry
在最近的一项调查中，新斯科舍省饲料发现，80％的食品银行客户确定缺乏收入和生活成本是其粮食不安全背后的主要原因。詹纳里（Jennery）说，黑人或土著新斯科舍省人的粮食不安全的可能性要高三倍。
He also pointed to the increasing number of people turning to Feed Nova Scotia for help.
虽然在食品银行注册的新客户的百分比通常约为3％至5％，但詹纳里（Jennery）表示，这个数字现在为6％至7％。在HRM和CBRM中，它跳至8％至10％。
此外，詹纳里（Jennery）表示，该组织不再仅仅依靠捐款。
“When I started seven years ago, we bought no food. We had enough food to distribute. Now we’re spending north of $1 million in order just to keep up,” Jennery said.
“The greatest impact is the impact that we don’t know. It’s the hidden hungry. It’s the people who feel disconnected, isolated, and are just quietly suffering. So that’s what I’m most concerned about.”
“简单的创可贴”
詹纳里（Jennery）说，新斯科舍省是加拿大最不安全的省份之一，他的组织分发的数百万公斤食品“仅仅是一个创可贴”。他说，必须使用“关键的政策杠杆”来满足通货膨胀率的增加，包括增加的收入援助率，这些收入援助率定期索引以符合通货膨胀。
詹纳里说：“我们应该通过将更高的最低工资设置为更接近生活工资来支持工人，以使低收入新斯科省人能够应付增加的生活成本。”
“We are in an affordable housing crisis. Low income renters are facing increased risks of poverty, food insecurity, and homelessness. Pass legislation that recognizes housing as a human right and create an equity-based affordable housing strategy with timelines and targets.”
Jennery was joined by Feed Nova Scotia’s director of community connections, Mohammed Al-Hamdani, who pointed to a recent Feed Nova Scotia survey of clients. It found that 85% of survey participants indicated they were spending more than 30% of their income on housing.
“That’s considered unaffordable housing. And if you ask individuals about their prescription use… about 50% of respondents said that they didn’t fill or collect a prescription for their medication or skipped a dose in the last 12 months because they don’t have enough money,” Al Hamdani said.
“And 56% specifically said that they had to sacrifice expenditure on food to pay for prescription drugs.”
‘我们知道那些孩子饿了’
该委员会还收到了NORISH NOVA SCOTIA执行董事Margo Riebe-Butt关于学校食品计划的关键作用的消息。她说，所提供的各种食物有所减少，尤其是水果和蔬菜等新鲜食品。
Despite the fact the school year isn’t yet over, many schools have also run out of budgeted funds.
Riebe-Butt said schools cited three main reasons: the significant increase in food costs; the “exponential” growth in the number of students accessing school food programs; and the additional costs of the pandemic model that required more pre-packaged foods.
“孩子们仍在挨饿程序可能run less days per week or end early in the year as budgets expire,” Riebe-Butt said.
Riebe-Butt wants a provincial government committee to begin negotiations with the federal government to make the cost-shared Canada-wide school food program a reality.
“There’s a return on investment for school food programs. For every dollar spent there’s a $3 to $10 return on investment,” Riebe-Butt said. “I wish I had investments that would make that kind of money. You know, this is an investment in our future here in Nova Scotia, and we all need to make it.”
Joy King, principal of Uniacke District School in Mount Uniacke, told the committee that of her 475 students, 90% access the school breakfast program. The school also provides a lunch program and pays for those lunches “for a large majority” of students.
In the last three months, King said their school food budget increased to equal what they paid in 2021 for the entire year.
“I have someone in the community who comes in and does the lunch program. We charge $4.75 for a lunch that includes a drink and a meal,” King said. “Every month we’re paying over $500 in school lunches… just to fund the students who do not have a lunch… There’s food going all day long. We know those kids are hungry.”
“农业是必不可少的缩影”
The executive director of the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture (NSFA) discussed the impact escalating food costs has on farmers.
“Farmers and their loved ones are absolutely impacted by the significant economic and social challenges our province is facing as a result of global events,” Carolyn Van Den Heuvel said.
“由于许多原因，我们的农民非常关注食物的成本，也是因为他们也是消费者。他们是消费者和生产者，通货膨胀对生产成本产生了巨大影响。生产食物的成本正在迅速增加，利润却没有。”
Van Den Heuvel said one long-term solution to ensuring safe, healthy, and affordable food and food security for Nova Scotians involves a strategic and sustainable investment in the province’s agriculture industry.
“After all, agriculture is the epitome of essential,” Van Den Heuvel said.
“我们生产对人类生活至关重要的食品和产品，并且随着食品的使用与由各个政府部门（包括医疗保健，教育和社会服务）负责的成功成果直接相关。”
Van Den Heuvel said the NSFA is advocating that a food and agriculture lens be applied to all policies and programs developed by the provincial government.
“The one industry we quite literally cannot live without has to be kept top of mind as decisions are made,” Van Den Heuvel said.
“我们需要成为发展省份，发展我们的商品经济并确保社区粮食安全的解决方案的一部分。”
“事情会变得更糟”
Dalhousie大学的农业食品分析实验室和食品分销和政策教授告诉委员会，他没有看到该省将粮食安全视为“真正的优先事项”。
Sylvain Charleboissaid since 2006, the province lost about 28% of its farms compared to the Canadian average of 16%. He said there’s little to no processing occurring in the province, and he’s advocating for a comprehensive food autonomy strategy that would include consumption of local food produced and processed in Nova Scotia.
“该省目前的粮食通货膨胀率为9.8％。会变得更糟。目前，我们目前面临的问题对乌克兰和许多国家ard积食物的冲突尤其严峻，”夏兰巴斯说。
“I don’t know if anyone is aware of what’s going on around the world, but things are going to get worse, I’m afraid, and so we need to be ready as a province and make our food economy less vulnerable as much as possible.”
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