September is Hunger Action Month, so Canadian food banks are launching a month-long campaign in their local communities.
The campaign aims to educate communities about the effects of hunger, and organize action individuals can take to prevent hunger in their neighbourhoods.
Advocacy for those who are hungry is more important than ever, as COVID-19 has disrupted the world as we know it.
The Sackville Food Bank, founded in 1988, experienced some changes during COVID-19.
They remained fully operational during the outbreak, but as most of the volunteers are seniors, many of them could not continue helping when COVID-19 spread to Canada.
The president of the Sackville Food Bank, Heather Patterson, says that thankfully many young volunteers have stepped up to help out instead.
Patterson says that she was surprised to see the number of clients go down during the outbreak.
In March of 2018, which is the most recent data available, they served 240 individuals, approximately 100 families, 86 of whom were children.
Patterson says she does not have more recent numbers yet as COVID-19 disrupted their research, but knows from experience that there were less people.
She still isn’t sure why the numbers went down, but suspects that their older clients stayed home initially for safety reasons.
The Rotary Club now delivers to those who cannot get the food in person.
There were also organizations that responded to the loss of breakfast programs when schools closed, resulting in more children being supplied with meals elsewhere.
Another theory as to why intake is low has to do with the CERB.
HP: I did talk to one client that I met downtown and I said, Why aren’t you coming? You know, we have lots of food because we really did, I mean, we got a whole lot of donations. She said, Well, I got some money from the federal government. I didn’t think I should come to the food bank too. I said, Well, I’m sure you have lots of things you could spend your money on, why don’t you come to the food bank, get the food and use the CERB, or whatever it is they were getting for other things.
Patterson says that she encourages folks to go to the food bank, regardless of whether or not they are receiving the CERB.
HP: Our clients, for the most part, are very respectful of the food bank, and are very grateful for it. So they don’t want to do anything that could be considered abusing it. But in our mind that wasn’t abusing it. If you got the CERB then come and get the food as well, because the CERB is going to stop and then you’re going to have all kinds of debts and stuff to pay. So we have the food. We were very lucky over the summer. We had very generous donations. We had great support from Food Banks Canada and from the provincial Food Depot Alimentare.
MC: If somebody requires your services, how can they go about getting them?
HP: Just come, they can either call the food bank, or go on our Facebook page and message me, or they could just come. We’re open Wednesday mornings 930 to 1130 for handing out our food. And so they could just come tell us they need us. We’re there for them.
MC: Okay, I assume you have some COVID-19 protocols in place for that?
HP: We do. We only allow one representative of a family in at a time and then they have to disinfect their hands when they come in. We ask them to wear masks. Sometimes they don’t have them. So like we were giving out masks for a while because we had a number of women step forward who were making masks at home and gave them to the food bank, which is wonderful.
The Sackville Food Bank can be reached at (506) 536-4164, and is located at 9B Willow Lane.
You do not have to be a regular client to go to the food bank.
By Meg Cunningham
