TISDALE, Sask. – Margaret Morris shuffles between the sink and the stove, cleaning pots, stirring sauces and sharing a laugh with a pair of women making lunch for a harvesting crew.
“I can’t drive a combine but I can cook a meal,” said the Newfoundland resident who came to this northeastern Saskatchewan farm with her husband, John, to help harvest crops for the Canadian Foodgrains Bank relief efforts overseas.
“It’s so fulfilling to be able to do something,” Morris said. “I can’t feed the millions, but somebody is going to get something from this.”
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In a nearby wheat field, most volunteers are new to farming. They come from backgrounds in the police force, accounting, teaching and trades. After a crash course in operating swathers and combines, they are put to work.
The 13-quarter Tisdale project, part of the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada’s Emergency Relief and Development Overseas, represents one of the foodgrains bank’s largest concentrations of land producing food for aid.
Volunteers come from across Canada and live in a house bought by the church, which also helps pay for inputs and equipment.
The days are long for the teams of six to eight workers, who normally arrive for a week at a time and seldom quit before evening.
Volunteer Joan Gibbon looks forward to the late-night food and fellowship.
“It just thrills you to know you’re helping the hungry in Africa,” she said.
There is no shortage of volunteers, said Diana King, who with her husband and pastor Calvin, have opened their own farmhouse to volunteers for the last eight years.
Calvin promotes the project across Canada and said he was changed forever during a trip to Africa 15 years ago.
“He felt impressed to do something for the poor people,” Diana King said, echoing his words. “They can’t cry anymore, I am going to cry for them.”
“When you live in a land of abundance, it’s not too much to share a bit,” said Calvin King.
Paul Gibbon of Embree, Nfld., was moved to help after the Kings visited his church.
“We live in our comfort zone and don’t think there are people who are starving to death,” said the former banker and now church pastor. “We don’t have a lot of money to give, but we have two hands to work.”
Work alone could not save the Saskatchewan crop from the impact of poor weather this year.
King remains confident quantity will make up for the lower quality of wheat, barley, flax, canola and peas.
The harvested crop will be sold to local elevators, with the proceeds matched four to one by the Canadian International Development Agency.
Kelvin Honsinger, a project supervisor, called the Kings “a driving force” behind the Tisdale farm.
He said the project is a local curiosity, with many stopping to ask why so many people are at work.
“It typically impresses people,” he said, noting volunteers occasionally pitch in to help with neighbours’ chores.
The Tisdale site is unique among the other foodgrains bank projects, which typically bring together a community to work on rented or borrowed land, said Dave Meier, the bank’s Saskatchewan co-ordinator. It is the second largest project in Saskatchewan behind one at Rosthern-Osler.
In total, there are 230 projects in Canada; 83 projects in Western Canada, 139 in Ontario and eight in Atlantic Canada.
Last year, the projects grew 15,000 tonnes of crop and delivered 16,000 tonnes of lentils, peas and wheat and $1 million in funding to 21 countries.
In lieu of direct involvement in such projects, Meier encouraged farmers to make tax-deductible donations of grain at their local elevators.
