Demand for food banks in Canada was high in December

According to Quebec Food Banks Director General Martin Munger, twice as many aid baskets were distributed this year compared to 2019.

Various food banks in the province distributed tens of thousands of food hampers in the run-up to Christmas, reducing stocks.

Demand was high throughout the year, and also during the Christmas seasonHe confirmed this in an interview with the Canadian News Agency.

Faced with this situation, Munger hopes the provincial government will adopt durable solutions to allow residents to have access to food and not have to turn to food banks, an emergency resource that currently helps one in ten Quebecers, he said.

It is essential that the number of people turning to food banks stops increasing. The situation is not sustainable. Food banks were not built to meet demand of this magnitude on an ongoing basis.

Christmas is always a time of increased demand

The situation described by Martin Munger in Quebec is similar to what is happening in other parts of the country, especially in Alberta.

Christmas is always a busy time for our food banks, but it becomes even busier when we take into account the demand that has been high throughout December. This puts more pressure on food bankssaid Shauna Bissell, CEO of the Food Bank of Alberta.

Organizations providing food to people in need across the country have reported an increase in assistance this year. The National Food Banking Network of Canada counted 1,935,911 food bank visits in March, the most recent data available at the national level, an increase of 32.1% compared to March 2022.

This number represents an increase of 78.5% since March 2019.

In Ontario, the country's most populous province, visits increased 36%, to 5,888,685 between April 2022 and March 2023, according to a November statement from Feed Ontario, Alimentando Ontario.

Bissell added that demand is so high in her network that it is impossible to set up reservations. Once the food supplies arrive, they are distributed to the people most in need.claimed.

In British Columbia, Dan Huang Taylor, CEO of the Food Bank of British Columbia, noted that 2023 was the busiest year for food banks in that province since they opened their doors in the early 1980s.

As in the rest of the country, demand was greater in December at food banks in British Columbia, but Huang Taylor stressed they were also able to count on greater support from residents.

We've seen a lot of people donate during the month of December. When people donate, whether it's money, food or even their time, it helps us respond to the increasing demand we face.claimed.

Source: RC/PC

Adaptation: RCI/R. Valencia