Vancouver Sun OpEd – What Exactly Is Canada’s Plan For Domestic Food Security?

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The Vancouver Sun recently published a grat article about Canada’s strategic food security plan – or lack thereof – and how it effects all Canadians.

Here’s an excerpt from the article:

What’s this got to do with Canada?

We already have unacceptable levels of food insecurity among our poorest while wealth concentrates in the hands of a minority to whom rising food costs are insignificant.

Researchers from McGill University, for example, found that moderate to severe food insecurity already affects 56 per cent of Canada’s Inuit population. But this isn’t a phenomenon of aboriginal households. It includes the working poor, the disabled and the unemployed.

The federal government has been tracking food insecurity since 2004. It reports that 46.6 per cent of Canadian families in the bottom 20 per cent of incomes experience moderate to severe food insecurity.

For those on social assistance, it’s 55.5 per cent; for those on employment insurance, 25.3 per cent; for single-parent households with children, 22.9 per cent.

In terms of whole numbers, this translates to almost two million Canadians -228,500 are children -living in food insecure households. Of these children, 20,000 live in severe food insecurity.

The full article can be found here.
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