Good morning, Madam Chair and members of the committee. My name is Aaron Vansintjan, and I am the policy lead at Food Secure Canada.
I'm here to tell you that food infrastructure is not boring. In fact, it is a matter of national priority. We need a serious countrywide build-out.
Here is a real-life story. Samuel Richard is a young farmer in Quebec. He loves growing organic vegetables, but access to the market has a steep price. Companies like Sobeys and Metro charge up to $12,000 just to be a vendor. Then there are the costs that go into storage, distribution and transport, so Samuel burned out a few years ago. Now he is back to growing only corn and soybeans for export. That's not just his loss but ours too.
Why is this happening? For decades, we have underinvested in local food infrastructure. It is emaciated. As a result, the middlemen and distributors have become too powerful. They dictate prices. Farmers like Samuel sell at a loss. As for consumers, I'll just say that according to a recent poll, grocery prices are now the number one economic concern to Canadians.
Even our schools can't afford this. We got $200 million per year for the school food program, but that investment is not even keeping up with food inflation. Many schools can't afford more than a single banana per kid. That is dire, and it is also a missed opportunity.
We can actually get affordable, delicious, healthy whole fruits and vegetables in our schools and in our grocery aisles. How? We can turn this crisis into a success story.
First, we need a buy Canadian food procurement strategy. In economics, demand drives supply. Let us say that you set local and regional procurement targets in federally funded schools, hospitals and prisons at 30% per year. By creating a new demand, you'll dramatically transform the supply chain within a few years, providing stable income for farmers and investing directly in rural communities, without the middlemen. A gap is turned into an opportunity.
The second step is to invest in the infrastructure to make sure farmers like Samuel don't have to quit. To do that, you fix what we at Food Secure Canada call the “missing middle”. We've heard so many stories where, for example, a school wants to buy local, but the farmer doesn't have a truck and the school doesn't have cold storage, so they're forced to buy from Sobeys.
The independent middle is missing in this country. To build it back up, we need you to expand the local food infrastructure fund from $20 million per year to—watch out—$500 million per year. I thought I saw someone fall out of their chair. Seriously, though, this is what it will take to rebuild the missing middle.
We have one last problem. We seriously lack competition, as you know, up and down the food chain. If it's profitable, it will get gobbled up. If it's not, it will get throttled. To make this work, we need to put up firewalls. That's why we need to invest in a co-operative and non-profit food system. Yes, we should be looking into public grocery stores. I'm sorry—did I say that?
There is a reason everyone is talking about them. Canadians want you to fight the rising cost of living and corporate concentration. To do that, you need to seriously look into a countrywide, non-profit distributor for small businesses, co-operatives, northern and remote communities, schools, prisons and hospitals. That may be what it will take to give small players like Samuel a chance to thrive.
Picture this. Within a few years, a 30% local food target in all federally funded schools would give farmers like Samuel a steady income. The LFIF would fund a cold storage warehouse where he and several other farmers could store their produce. A new non-profit wholesaler would buy his produce at a reasonable price and would distribute it to independent grocery stores, saving consumers a lot of money, and Samuel could grow food that's good for the land and good for its people.
You can make this happen. Start a buy Canadian food procurement strategy, massively invest in the LFIF and expand non-profit distribution, wholesale and retail.
I hope I have convinced you that food infrastructure is not boring. It is exciting. It is also existential.
Thank you.