Annual ‘Hunger Report’
MINDEMOYA—The overall number of users of the Manitoulin Family Resources (MFR) Food Bank has increased in the past year while donations have gone down significantly. This appears to be the result of increased costs for things like food, housing and transportation, and that many of those who have been able to donate food in the past can no longer afford to.
For 2023-2024, “the general theme is that the number of visitors to the food bank are up, and donations are down,” said Vanessa Glasby, food security program coordinator of MFR food bank. MFR has just released its 2023-2024 Manitoulin Hunger Report. “We have seen a seven percent increase over the previous year and an increase of almost 50 percent compared to pre-COVID times (2018-2019).” The numbers reveal food bank use is on the rise all across the country, including Manitoulin. From April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024, the MFR food bank served a total of 4,588 individuals (1,635 households). This represents a seven percent increase over 2022-2023, and a 46.2 percent increase over pre-COVID times.”
Among the 1,635 households who visited during this time period, 28.0 percent had never visited the food bank before (a 14 percent increase over the number of new households in 2022-2023). “This number is similar to our pre-COVID rates, where approximately 28 percent of our clients each year would be first-time visitors.”
As with last year’s report, the communities least represented in percentage of food bank visits were those located furthest from the MFR food bank (located in Mindemoya). “This is likely due to transportation barriers.
“I think there are a lot of factors as to why we have seen such a high increase in the number of visitors to the food bank,” said Ms. Glasby. “One being the cost of living, with groceries, housing (rent) and standard expenses having all increased, while wages have not kept up. People are struggling to pay for basic things like rent, groceries and transportation. And social assistance through ODSP and Ontario Works have not kept up to the increases.”
About one-third of users of the food bank are children/youth between the age of 0-17. There has also been an increase in the number of seniors who are using the food bank. “Senior pensioners used to be able to survive on one pension, but the dollar is not stretching as far as it used to,” said Ms. Glasby.
Suze Morrison, of the Ontario Federation of Indigenous Friendship Centres, noted in a 2023 new interview that, “wage discrimination, the historical impacts of colonization and residential schools, access to education and employment and housing discrimination (are all factors at play) when it comes to the overrepresentation of Indigenous clientele at emergency food programs.”
Individuals residing on Manitoulin’s First Nation communities made up 72.42 percent of all food bank visits in 2023-2024 (compared to 68 percent in 2022-2023). “At the MRF food bank (self-identified Indigenous clients) represent 52.2 per of our clientele, despite making up approximately 40.6 percent of the total population of the Island. It is safe to say that our Indigenous community members are vastly overrepresented in our food bank statistics.”
More than 50 percent of clients visited only once or twice over the course of the year. “While some of our clients required consistent support from our food bank, many simply need help making ends meet when expenses get too high to bear,” the report notes.
According to Feed Ontario, one in seven food banks in the province (including MFR) purchase 20 percent or more of the food they distribute to their clients. “We purchase an estimated 49.3 percent of the food we distribute, though this percentage varies greatly depending on the time of year and grant funding available to our organization. Although our community is very supportive of our work, especially during our Christmas hamper campaign, we simply do not receive enough donations to feed everyone who needs it,” the report states. “We spend many thousands of dollars each month on food items (average $13,000) excluding items we receive through Feed Ontario’s Full Shelves and Smarter Needs Allocation Programs (SNAP), as these items are provided to us free of cost through our membership in Feed Ontario. The total value of food that moves through our food bank each month is estimated to be around $13,000 at the time of writing this report. This is exclusive of our Christmas Hamper Campaign, which alone channels more than $100,000 worth of food to Manitoulin Island families in the month of December each year.”
“Our larger Food Banks Canada and Feed Ontario have stated food banks are not supposed to be a permanent solution to food insecurity, we are supposed to be a band-aid solution,” said Ms. Glasby. “But we have become a permanent structure.”
Ms. Glasby said that donations to the food bank are down significantly. “My theory for this is that folks in the middle (class) have always had a little extra to contribute but have now lost this buffer with the increase in cost of living and everything else. The group in the middle have lost the capacity to support food banks.”
“We are doing okay in terms of our major donors,” said Ms. Glasby. “However, from April-May this year compared to last year we saw a 64 percent increase in demand for support and an 81 percent reduction in food donations.”
In a recent CBC article, Feed Ontario executive director Carolyn Stewart noted that the rising cost of living is having an impact both on food bank attendance and food bank donations. Shelves that would once be stocked for two to three months are now only stocked for two weeks. “We have noticed this at our MFR food bank, many of the individuals who used to donate occasionally just don’t have the extra funds to do so anymore. As a result, MFR has had to spend more money purchasing food to keep shelves stocked. Thankfully, we have not yet had to turn any client away without food, as some of our fellow food banks in other parts of Ontario have.”
“In addition to food bank usage being on the rise locally the makeup of primary household income sources for those who access the food banks is also changing,” the report says. “For example, data collected by the MFR Food Bank show that during last years’ reporting period (2022-2023) roughly 2.3 percent of local food bank clients reporting having full-time employment as their income source. In this year’s data 2023-2024) that percent has risen to 3.4 percent. For comparison, in the 2018-2019 reporting period 0.9 percent of clients reported full-time employment as their primary income source. The difference between the two percentage figures for full-time employment income as a primary source, doesn’t seem that large, but the percentage change between (2018-2019) and (2023-2024) is very large (more than 277 percent).”
“Another way to look at this trend is this; of the 1,161 households served by the food bank in 2018-2019, approximately 10 indicated income from a full-time job as a primary source of income. By 2023-2024, approximately 55 of the 1,635 households accessing food bank indicated full-time employment income as a primary source of income,” the report continues.
In terms of housing, “As a highly sought after vacation spot, Manitoulin has seen a significant increase in short-term rental units. More and more real estate owners have chosen this option over long-term lease agreements, perceiving short-term rentals to be financially lucrative and lower risk than the long-term option. As a result of this and other factors, many households have been forced out of long-term stable housing and into insecure situations. Some have moved back in with family, some sleep on friend’s couches and some live in personal vehicles or seasonal trailers, most of which offer inadequate water access and climate control for safe habitation.”
“Housing has long been a driver of food bank use in Ontario. It is generally the single-largest expense for a household, and it is typically non-negotiable. One cannot skip a housing payment, so often households will instead skip or reduce other bills such as groceries in order to afford housing.” As well, the cost of shelter in Ontario increased by 5.43 percent between December 2022 and December 2023. Rent is ever higher at 6.9 percent.
A recent Food Banks Canada study identified physical barriers (e.g. lack of transportation from a food bank) as one of the four main type of barriers clients face when trying to access food bank support. “This is especially true in our community. With a coverage area of roughly 2,766 square kilometres, the MFR Food Bank supports a wide range of households, many of whom are over an hour’s driving distance away from our primary location in Mindemoya. There is no public transportation system on Manitoulin Island currently. Many of our clients also lack access to a personal vehicle, relying instead on rides from friends, hitchhiking, or expensive taxi rides to come pick up their food hampers.”
“Recognizing this as a barrier, and thanks to funding from Food Banks Canada, MFR is able to launch a community hub pilot program in the summer of 2024,” Ms. Glasby continued. “This funding has allowed MFR to hire two new employees, a driver and a food handler’s assistant and offer delivery to six community hubs around the Island, thereby bringing emergency food support that much closer to clients’ homes. Some of the community hubs are able to offer delivery to client’s homes, while others will serve as pickup depots.”
“An effective social safety net should ideally ensure that no person drops below a certain threshold of poverty,” the report continues. “Unfortunately, in Canada, many are falling through the cracks.”
Social assistance remains the primary source of income for the majority of food bank visitors. Provincially, 26 percent of food bank visitors rely on OW as their primary source of income and 28 percent rely on the ODSP program. “At our food bank, 30.2 percent of visitors rely on OW, and 21.9 rely on ODSP. Interesting, these rates are lower than what our food bank saw in 2022-2023 or 2018-2019, but we have seen simultaneous increases in rates of employed individuals and pensioners requesting food support.”
The report notes, “Last year’s Manitoulin Hunger Report noted that, “with limited resources, it is very likely that this need will begin to outpace what food banks like (MFR) are capable of supporting. To date, the MFR food bank has not had to turn anyone requesting emergency food support away due to a lack of available food; and we are very proud of this. We are, however, seeing a continued rise in the number of visits, with no signs of slowing down. This, coupled with a stark decrease in the quantity of donations coming into the food bank makes for an alarming forecast for our organization.”
“To reiterate last year’s report, ‘we must combine emergency food assistance with long-term sustainable solutions to issues experienced by those walking through our doors in order to achieve food security and eliminate hunger in our community. We need local municipal, provincial and federal representatives to help us advocate for wraparound support and policy shifts to address the major systemic issues that are keeping our community members in a state of poverty and food insecurity. We cannot do this on our own and we are, by no means, the ultimate solution to hunger in our community. Our hope is that one day, our services will no longer be required. Until that day, we will continue to be there to support those who need it.”
