There has been no research. This has been a labour of love from needing to be productive in society.
We deliver food, but it's not just food. We deliver everything a family needs for that month, from bread products to school snacks to toiletries. We add in creative items for the veterans, and every one of the boxes that is delivered is curated for that family. Although we don't know who they are, we know the make-up. We ensure that the appropriate amount is in there. I think I've always had a passion for ensuring that people have safety and are secure. As a medic, the only thing I did was to look out for everyone who came my way.
The food hampers, though, are not the primary focus of the farm; the primary focus of the farm is allowing women to come and find their own sense of purpose, joy, and healing and be with other women. The by-product of all of that has led to the ability of these women to find a purpose in curating these boxes to support both serving and veteran members. It's all circular. We deliver the food, we grow the food, we harvest the food, and then we pack the food. While doing that, women are gaining informal peer support in a way that they don't even recognize. They do not recognize that there is a compassionate listening ear trying to see if there's a way to navigate the difficulties they're facing.
Food insecurity doesn't have anything to do with the forces; however, our veteran community in rural Nova Scotia has limited access to fresh, nutritional grocery stores and public transit. There is none. If you're a senior veteran stuck in your home in wherever in the valley, how are you going to get fed? Where are the people checking on you? When boxes are delivered by service officers from the Legion, those Legion service officers check on the families we are supporting. They are doing wellness checks without their even knowing that they're doing wellness checks.
Even though we are doing this in Nova Scotia, I think it could be replicated anywhere in this country. It is not hard to find a plot of land, a space to grow whatever is needed in that moment. It all comes back to women supporting women, veterans supporting veterans and finding a way to navigate this new world that you didn't think you were going to be in but that you now find yourself struggling in.