As we move into high summer and farmers across the country start bringing in their annual crops, the image of a group of accountants from PricewaterhouseCoopers pitching in to harvest fruits and vegetables is probably not what springs to mind.
But that’s exactly what happened last summer at an Ontario farm as part of a growing trend amongst food-based nonprofits trying to close the gap between Canada’s neediest citizens and access to healthy food produced in a sustainable, eco-friendly manner.
“We got many corporate teams out last year and they very much enjoyed themselves,” says Carolyn Stewart, acting operations manager for food distribution at Community Harvest Ontario (CHO). “Our volunteers picked over 100,000 pounds of fruit and vegetables last year.”
CHO is a program launched in the summer of 2010 by the Ontario Association of Food Banks (OAFB) to partner with Ontario farms in an effort to increase the amount of fresh produce available in food banks while supporting local agriculture. The initiative is supported by the Ontario Trillium Foundation, Metcalf Foundation and Ontario’s Greenbelt.
A two-tier food system
In recent years there has been growing awareness that the large-scale industrial food system that feeds much of our society has serious flaws. Epidemics of obesity and diabetes have been linked to a poor diet of processed food in North America. Factory farming techniques introduce toxic chemicals and pollutants into the food system and natural environment. Food is often transported thousands of miles to consumers, leaving a sizeable carbon footprint, and processing plants have been hit with outbreaks of contaminants such as listeria and salmonella. Mass production has also fostered an attitude of entitlement amongst consumers, who frequently lack cooking skills yet expect food to be readily available at low prices.
In response to these issues, there has been a rising movement amongst food professionals and informed consumers to embrace locally produced foods, farmed in a sustainable manner, often using organic methods.
But such foods are expensive due to costs associated with smaller-scale production. This has created a two-tier system in which wealthier consumers have better access to such healthy foods, while lower-income consumers are still frequently faced with a diet of cheap, industrial food.
From farm to table
Enter programs like CHO, devised to increase the OAFB’s supply of healthy produce while supporting local farmers. “Last year, one in five food banks didn’t have enough food to meet demand,” says Stewart, “[and] over 70% of clients didn’t have access to the required daily servings of fruit and vegetables.”
CHO provides funding to growers to help them purchase farm equipment. In return, the farmers donate crops to their local food banks. The program also sends out volunteers — oftentimes corporate staff on teambuilding exercises, such as those PricewaterhouseCoopers accountants — to harvest any excess farm crops that will not be going to market. They also receive donations of blemished produce that is perfectly edible but unmarketable to traditional consumer channels. The program has grown from two to eight farms this year and aims to add another five next year.
While all farms in the program observe environmentally sustainable practices, what’s most remarkable is three are actually certified organic growers. Plan B Organic Farm delivered some 25,000 pounds of organic vegetables to the Hamilton Food Share last year, while Roots & Shoots Farm aims to donate some 11,000 pounds of organic carrots to the Ottawa Food Bank this year, and Dolway Organic Garden is growing Detroit Red Beets for the London and Area Food Bank.
To find such sustainably produced, locally raised organics at food banks, which typically thrive on donations of non-perishable, industrially produced packaged goods, is a significant step toward closing the gap between the needy and access to healthier food.
A focus on community
Another Ontario-based nonprofit working to create a new paradigm for how their clients gain access to healthy food is The Stop, an organization that embodies the philosophy that “healthy food is a basic human right.” With two facilities in Toronto, the nonprofit offers ambitious programs that include an urban agriculture system producing some 4,000 pounds of produce annually. They also run community cooking events, meal drop-ins, a food bank, sustainable food systems classes for children, and they host a weekly farmer’s market that focuses on local, sustainable, organic and artisanal products. They achieve this with a broad swath of funders including corporations, faith groups, government, and over 45 private foundations that have lent their support. Community members are fully involved in decision making and the organization’s activities, which are designed to foster community building, develop support networks and empower participants to develop a viable and effective response to hunger and the need for nutritious food.
The quantitative measures are impressive: in 2010 The Stop served more than 15,000 meals, distributed almost 40,000 food hampers, gave 28,500 seedlings to community gardens, and saw $1 million worth of product sold through their market.
Kathryn Scharf, The Stop’s program director, says that the organization is thriving because of its commitment to increasing access to healthy food in a manner that maintains dignity, builds community and challenges inequality. “We care about delicious, we care about nutritious,” says Scharf. “We care about who grows our food and we try to use our purchasing power to support local and sustainable producers.”
Scharf says The Stop has a sizeable food budget, which affords them a luxury not found in many food organizations.
“We have great chefs,” she states, which include Chris Brown and Scott MacNeil, both full-time employees at The Stop that come from the fine-dining world. “They have really superior food skills,” says Scharf. “They can order food in efficient ways, they have connections within the food industry. They understand nutrition and how to make food delicious, and how to cook in quantity and use leftovers.”
With gardens, farm partners, and chefs, The Stop’s interlocking programs, says Scharf, achieve a “critical mass” around food that makes them successful. That model is now being replicated. In January, The Stop will open its first branch plant in Perth, Ontario, to be run in conjunction with the Perth and District Food Bank, and next spring, they will open in Stratford, Ontario, in partnership with the United Way of Perth-Huron.
And they won’t be stopping there.
“We are embarking on fundraising for a new organization that will be dedicated to expansion,” says Scharf. Tentatively called Community Food Centers Canada, the organization will be tasked with establishing Stop-type food hubs in communities across the country. “We don’t know at what pace or in what time frame yet, but we are ambitious.”
Dining out to raise funds
In Montreal, the NDG Food Depot has some ambitions of its own. Although slightly smaller in scale than The Stop’s, they are equally creative.
“We have a big campaign in August for our 25th anniversary,” says executive director Fiona Keats. Under its normal programs, NDG, which takes its name from the Notre-Dame-de-Gr?ce neighbourhood that it serves, provides such services as emergency food baskets, cooking classes and container-gardening workshops for its clients. From the August 19 – 28, however, during NDG Arts Week, they will be partnering with 17 local restaurants that have promised to donate a portion of their revenues under a special program called “Dine for the Depot.”
Keats convinced two of those restaurants — Sushi Yumi and Restaurant Azar — to introduce organic dishes to their menus made with produce and meats from Ferme du Zéphyr, a local organic farm that itself makes donations to the NDG Food Depot.
Such innovative fundraising methods build community by helping to close the loop between the consumer and organic farmer (a champion of environmental sustainability), while also supporting the neighbourhood’s less-privileged citizens. “We are not just working on educating the people who come to us for food,” says Keats, “but the community at large, to create a new market so that maybe one of the restaurants will decide there is a market for organics.”
Investing in food, saving on health
Another nonprofit deeply involved in this movement to re-shape our relationship with food is Food Matters Manitoba (FMM). Based in Winnipeg, FMM is governed by the Manitoba Food Charter, a declaration drawn up in 2005-2006 expressing a commitment to building a “just and sustainable food system” in the province. With 60 charter signatories and 190 partner organizations, including municipalities, private enterprises, churches, community centres, native groups, agricultural associations and other community-based nonprofits, FMM aims to cultivate community food skills through hands-on programs, develop public awareness and partner capacity, and to build networks across Manitoba’s food system.
“There has been an explosion of interest in food security over the last three to four years,” says executive director Kreesta Doucette. “We are increasingly seeing food as linked to our health, economy, culture and environment. In response to globalization, people are focusing on something that is tangible and local.”
Just a few of the initiatives FMM has been involved with in the past year include the Northern Growing Projects, which worked with 500 participants in 13 First Nations, northern and remote communities to establish 60 new community and individual gardens. In Winnipeg’s North End, FMM partnered with the North End Food Security Network (NEFSN) to undertake a community food assessment and identify ways to increase access to healthy food in that neighbourhood. FMM also held a cooking competition, called Locavore Iron Chef Cook-off, which saw 26 teams of high school students, partnered with chef mentors, challenged to create new recipes using local and sustainably produced ingredients.
“In Manitoba, 43% of the provincial budget goes to health care,” says Doucette. “Studies in the US have shown that a dollar spent on food programs can save $10 in healthcare costs down the road.”
And the government does not appear to be sitting on the sidelines in FMM?s initiatives: the Government of Manitoba and Rural Secretariat of Canada happen to sit in FMM?s handful of major funders.
The lack of equal access to sufficient fresh, nutritious and sustainably produced foods is one of many complex problems confronted by organizations in the nonprofit sector — this one intertwined with issues around poverty, health and the environment and requiring new, broad-based solutions involving a variety of partners. Organizations like Food Matters Manitoba, NDG Food Depot, The Stop and Community Harvest Ontario are just a few of the nonprofits looking toward the future and working hard to close the gap in Canadians’ access to high quality, fresh food.
Foodbanks by the numbers
How many are being helped by food banks?
- 867,948 in March 2010 – the highest level on record (9% were first-time users)
- 3,459,544 meals served by food banks in March 2010 (6.4% higher than 2009)
Who are food banks helping?
- 38% are children and youth
- 51% are families with children
- 17% have income from current or recent employment
- 15% receive disability-related income supports
- 51% receive social assistance benefits
How are Canadian food banks managing the increase in need?
- 31% of food banks do not have enough food to meet the need
- 50% of food banks have been forced to give out less food than usual
- 57% bought more food than usual to meet the need
- Nearly half have no paid staff
Despite the fact that many of Canada’s rural communities are located in prime agricultural areas, hunger is a reality for tens of thousands of the nation’s rural residents. About half of the food banks participating in HungerCount 2010 are located in rural communities (defined as having populations of fewer than 10,000 people).
Statistics courtesy of Food Banks Canada.
Shaun Smith is a journalist and novelist in Toronto. He was co-founder of the literary event series This Is Not A Reading Series, and he has written extensively about books and the publishing industry for such publications as The Toronto Star, Quill & Quire, The Globe & Mail and CBC.ca. His YA novel Snakes & Ladders was published by the Dundurn Group in 2009.
Please note: While we ensure that all links and e-mail addresses are accurate at their publishing date, the quick-changing nature of the web means that some links to other web sites and e-mail addresses may no longer be accurate.
