A Snapshot of Food Security in Saskatchewan

In Regina, stakeholders engaged in the conversation all agree that there is an increasing need for emergency food response while also a strengthening of local food systems through collaboration and community building for longer term sustainable change. Addressing systemic barriers to localized food efforts through policy and spurring government investment into housing and guaranteed basic income were also identified as critical in order to meet commitments to the Sustainable Development Goals.

I notice the steady incline of the number of boxes that are needed. When I started, most I had to make was 20 and tomorrow it’s 40-50. It varies and keeps going up.

The price of food is going up, it seems every day. The people come here, 40-50% are homeless, they have nowhere to go or stay. To give them weekly hampers helps them to survive. The food from the food bank is not enough to feed the family. A family of 5-6 is a lot to feed. The homeless are staying at family or friend’s houses; grandparents are taking care of their grandkids. We have many households who are now intergenerational; many ages and generations staying in one household.

There is a fundamental disconnect between the reality of what's going on in communities and what the provincial Government thinks is going in communities. The realities of the cost of living within our communities, regardless of whether we're talking about Regina, Saskatoon, Yorkton, Swift Current or another small rural community in the north; whatever it is, there is a complete and total disconnect to reality. A living wage is the thing that we should be striving for knowing also that an acceptable living wage is above minimum wage.

Food Banks came into existence and that was going to be a temporary measure for a very short time and yet here we are decades later. Now we have community fridges which is a wonderful way to provide people with access, but why in a country as rich as Canada, do we have to have Community Fridges and Food Banks? Why do we not have more outrage? The situation needs to be brought to the public’s attention and draw attention to it. Addressing the issue has to involve raising the profile of how great an issue food insecurity is in this country.

I think what we noticed personally is that food security is really fragile. People assume they are safe and that they are secure; if they have employment. It doesn’t take very much to tip that scale and be in that situation. Those using the food bank are assumed to live on the fringe of society, but in reality anyone could be there in a heartbeat and living between paycheck to paycheck, and suddenly you’re relying on it [food bank].

There are so many who are one paycheck away from being out on the street. There are problems with the provincial government not frankly seeming to care about the plight of poverty and homlessness in our province. You live in a province like Saskatchewan where we, you know, have huge farms and food, and yet the exorbitant cost of living keeps going up. Adult children are still living with their parents or families continue to live together because the children can’t afford to live on their own.

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