Thank you to the esteemed members of the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs for inviting Second Harvest Canada to provide some remarks.
Second Harvest is by no means an expert in the complex and multi-faceted challenges of northern and indigenous food security. What we can tell you is that food security or food insecurity is an outcome of poverty, and food security will only be possible when there are systems and supports in place for people to be able to access the food, housing and other essentials they need, when they need them, without the need for charitable organizations like mine. In the interim, it's imperative we get healthy food to communities at no cost to them.
For those of you unfamiliar with Second Harvest, we're the largest food rescue charity in the country. We're unique in that we redistribute primarily perishable food, and we work at the intersection of hunger relief and environmental protection.
We do this because in Canada 58% of all the food produced is lost or wasted, including 11.2 million metric tonnes of surplus food that could easily be rescued and redistributed. That's enough food to feed every Canadian for five months.
At Second Harvest we create systems to redirect that food to charities, non-profits and northern and indigenous communities. We do this with technology as well as trucks, trains, boats and planes to ensure that this surplus food stays out of landfill where it releases greenhouse gases, like methane, and directly contributes to the climate crisis.
In Canada, there are over 60,000 charities, non-profits and indigenous organizations that use food in their programs. As we are all aware, northern and indigenous communities are disproportionately affected by food insecurity and by climate change.
We have heard that in Fort Smith people have used boats to hunt moose along Slave River for generations, but wet weather and a short spring created so much water higher up in the woods that moose were not walking along the river this fall, which impacted the hunt and the food supply.
Food insecurity is only going to get worse as many communities depend on ice roads for transporting crucial supplies. With the increasing incidence of winter road closures, and reduced load weight limits, there are higher costs for delivering food.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Second Harvest created the Food Rescue Canadian Alliance. This was a national collaboration of industry, government, NGOs and indigenous communities. Our mandate was simply to identify where there would be high volumes of surplus food across the supply chain, and to connect it with the communities that had an increased demand for food.
The indigenous working group came together in an effort to support non-indigenous food relief organizations like mine to distribute food and funds meaningfully to address the heightened food insecurity concerns of many, but especially indigenous, rural and remote communities.
Since then, Second Harvest has led several northern projects, including a grocery gift card program where we leverage funding from the Sprott Foundation to provide over $4.5 million in grocery gift cards with grocers like the Northern Store. The Sprott Foundation has provided over $21 million in COVID relief to food and housing causes.
We offer grants, up to $20,000, through the federal government's emergency food security fund. We ensured our application process was flexible and accessible to northern and indigenous communities, which resulted in the disbursement of about $2.7 million.
Additionally, through the federal government's surplus food rescue program, of which we are strong advocates, we were able to source, process and deliver about two million pounds of fresh, healthy, free food to communities that included fish, chicken, bison and frozen vegetables.
As the government subsidies conclude, we know how critical it is for us to continue to provide these services to communities. However, the logistical infrastructure necessary to get food to the many remote and isolated communities is prohibitively expensive, and a serious contributor to food insecurity.
In the Northwest Territories alone, we all know 33 communities cover one million square kilometres of land, which makes getting good healthy food at a decent price difficult to say the least.
For example, in Aklavik, we shipped a container of 20 skids of mostly meat to a community of about 590 people. The cost was over $85,000 for one shipment. Transporting perishable healthy food is especially complex and expensive.
However, we are committed to ensuring this surplus food will reach the communities that want the food. This is achievable with government support and philanthropic gifts for transportation like the one we received through the Slaight Family Foundation, in combination with amazing logistic partners, including Arctic Co-operatives Limited, Arctic Consultants and Uber Freight, along with essential collaboration with territorial and indigenous government representatives, communities and organizations.
Without a doubt, these challenges existed long before the pandemic, and although nutrition north has attempted to tackle rising food costs, statistics have continued to expose the food insecurity faced by communities, which is increasing in some communities by up to 80%.
We believe there is an opportunity for investment in an indigenous-led organization that can address and mobilize partners such as Second Harvest. There is also an opportunity to examine what strategies have worked, because as we all know, food insecurity is a serious public health issue, and one solution will not work in every community.
We also need audacious leadership and collaboration to support indigenous-led solutions to decrease and ultimately eradicate food insecurity and poverty in northern and indigenous communities.
I want to thank you for providing Second Harvest Canada an opportunity to speak. I would be happy to answer any questions.
