Mr. Chair and members of the committee, thank you for the invitation.
Our central message this morning is that a permanent school food program can provide meaningful support to children and families, but permanence must come with protection against rising costs and clear evidence of results. Feeding children at school must also be accompanied by policies that improve food affordability at home.
Our fall 2026 Canadian food sentiment index reported that 32% are using savings or borrowing money to buy food, up 4% from a year earlier. Many families are also experiencing couponing or savings fatigue after years of high inflation.
Our earlier research also identified nutritional trade-offs. In our 2025 study, 45.5% of respondents reported prioritizing costs over nutritional value more than a year earlier. That finding helps explain why access to food and access to nutritious food must be considered together.
Slower inflation does not reverse the price increases families have already absorbed, nor does a national inflation average capture the cost of delivering a nutritious meal in a remote community.
Our forward-looking analysis also identifies three pressures that school food budgets must anticipate right now.
The first is diesel. Our lab's scenario indicates that, if high diesel prices persist through winter, grocery inflation could peak 0.5 to 0.7 percentage points above an easing baseline. These costs move through farming, processing and transportation with a delay.
The second is the Canadian dollar. In our currency scenarios, a dollar at 68¢ U.S. could bring fruit inflation to 4% and vegetable inflation to 5.5%, all else being equal. These are category inflation rates, not additional percentage point increases. A weaker dollar reduces importers' purchasing power, particularly during the winter produce season.
The third is the super El Niño. Our outlook identifies disrupted rainfall and harvest as a risk to agricultural supplies and food-processing costs into 2027.
These are conditional scenarios, and the effects should not simply be added together. They reinforce the need to protect school meal budgets against changing costs.
We offer four recommendations. First, protect the purchasing power of program funding. Second, combine national accountability with local delivery. Third, make equitable access practical. Fourth, measure what children receive and consume.
The lab's research supports taking household affordability pressures seriously. It does not establish that school meals alone can resolve them. Children also eat on weekends, during holidays and throughout the summer. The committee should, therefore, connect this program with broader work on household incomes, grocery competition, transportation and supply chain costs. A school meal can help a family today; lasting food security also requires that family to afford nutritious food outside school.
We support making school food dependable. Parliament should insist that permanent funding delivers sustained access to nutritious meals with transparent costs and measurable benefits for children.
Along with this statement, we also supplied you with copies of our forecast and of our index that was released a few weeks ago.
Thank you. I welcome your questions.