It is difficult to find out from farm families using food banks why they are there and whether they are receiving counseling to improve their economic situation, says a Regina food bank executive.
They tend to eat and run.
“In my experience with farm families needing to access food banks, I have found this is a tremendous blow to their self-esteem,” Wayne Hellquist, chief executive officer of the Regina and District Food Bank, told members of the Senate agriculture committee last week.
“Usually, they do not want to hang around and have a conversation and are in a hurry to hightail it out of the food bank. Having to go to a food bank is the last straw for farmers because they deem it an admission of failure when they cannot produce enough food and generate enough income to feed their families.”
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Evidence about the expanding presence of food banks in rural Canada and increased use by farm families came as members of the committee announced plans to tour across the country to probe poverty issues through public hearings.
They hope to receive information from some of those farmers and other rural residents reticent to tell their stories at food banks.
“We want to talk to rural Canadians in all parts of Canada,” said committee chair Joyce Fairbairn in announcing the national tour begins next week in Newfoundland. “They have an important story to tell. We are going there to learn how rural poverty is affecting them and to obtain their views on how best to deal with the problems of rural poverty.”
The committee will hold hearings throughout the Atlantic provinces in February and plans prairie hearings in March.
A final report to the Senate will be presented later this year. An interim report published in December called rural poverty a largely ignored problem in Canada that affects hundreds of thousands of Canadians with low incomes, isolation, poor services and little voice.
Last week, food bank advocates set the stage for the committee hearings by telling them that food banks are a growth industry in rural Canada.
“Despite the fact that many Canadian rural communities are located in prime agricultural areas, this is a reality for tens of thousands of the nation’s rural residents,” said Diane Swinemar, executive director of Feed Nova Scotia.
“The need for rural food bank users to turn to food banks is associated with the larger socio-economic vulnerability of many people in Canada, a change in the social safety net that has deteriorated significantly.”
