By Liam Verster

supporting food banks

Food Banks in Peace Region among those to benefit from Food Surplus Program

Aug 19, 2020 | 12:18 PM

The federal Food Surplus Program is supplying Food Banks Canada with $11,358,529 to buy surplus meat and eggs from Canadian producers, and distribute it to local food banks across the country.

The Food Banks Canada network is made up of Provincial Associations, which represent approximately 650 food banks across the country. Food Banks Alberta represents 95 of those members, including the Beaverlodge Christmas Hamper & Food Bank, Hythe and District Food Bank Society, Fairview Food Bank Association and High Prairie & District Food Bank Society.

Arianna Johnson, the Senior Projects Manager for Food Banks Alberta, says once Food Banks Canada gets the federal funding, they will buy up the food, of which Food Banks Alberta will get a portion.

“Alberta will stand to receive somewhere around 5.36 per cent of that, to be shared with 95 members across the province. Calgary and Edmonton will receive their own percentages, so that will be separate from Food Banks Alberta.”

Once they have the product, Food Banks Alberta will use the information from the National Hunger Count, which is done in food banks across the country every March. The amount of food each food bank will receive will be proportional to the average amount of people they serve.

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Johnson adds that this program is very welcome news, especially with the way things have been in the past several months.

“When COVID first kind of started and was declared an emergency, most of our food banks experienced a very large drop in donations. I had some food banks that experienced a hundred per cent decrease in food donations in particular. So, it’s important for us as a Provincial Association to be able to ensure that they have a supply of food, to keep feeding the people within their community.”

She also says it’s extremely good news to have meats and eggs supplied to food banks, as they’re not a common donation.

“Perishable food is something that not all food banks have the ability to secure and distribute. So, being able to offer that to our membership as an option for the people that they feed, especially in the form of proteins, which is the most important and hardest product for our food banks to maintain within our stock, it was a really exciting time for us.”

It’s not yet known when Food Banks Canada will have purchased the surplus food or distributed it to provincial bodies, or how much exactly each local food bank will be receiving through this program.