Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I offer a sincere good morning or good afternoon to you, honourable members of the committee, and to Canada C3 alumni, wherever you may find yourselves this morning. I sincerely appreciate the opportunity to participate and share a perspective on the challenges to food security in Canada's remote, fly-in communities.
I think Monsieur Lelievre would agree that when we look backwards or listen to and read the stories of early co-op leaders in Canada's Arctic, I for one have come to recognize that the co-operative movement was one of economic reconciliation, food security, social enterprise and collective entrepreneurship long before anyone had actually coined or defined these terms. Co-ops work together and have diversified over the decades to achieve scale in pursuit of their vision of people working together to improve their social and economic well-being.
Given the short time allotted, I'd like to confirm our organization's belief that a holistic food security discussion includes elements of country foods, which have historically sustained the people of Canada's Arctic and remain the most nutritious and culturally appropriate diet for many of the residents of Canada's remote fly-in communities.
Despite this, I'm going to focus my comments today more on store-bought food, an area with which our organization is most familiar and has the largest capacity to affect.
It's very simple to compare the shelf price of widgets in Winnipeg with that of widgets in Whale Cove. Many people would point to freight costs or other high operating costs as the reason to explain some of these differences.
Residents in the north move cargo around. They purchase airline tickets. They pay high costs for such basic utilities as electricity and the internet. Therefore, I think many have an appreciation of these cost differences. However, many will not fully appreciate the vital role that economies of scale—or more accurately, the lack thereof—play in the cost of goods in remote communities.
The NNC program commissioned a report on this exact matter, entitled “The Roles of Scale, Remoteness, Business Structure, Competition and Other Operational Factors in Nutrition North Canada's Relationship with Canada's Northern Retail Operations”, authored by A.J. Phillips & Associates, November 2017. For the benefit of the members of the committee, I will send a copy of this report to the clerk of the committee. I highly encourage committee members to review this report for an interesting and informative assessment of these topics.
From the executive summary, however, I'd like to highlight the following:
The Nunavut economy lacks the scale or “critical mass” to support a normal market structure, and
The long supply chains, with missing modes, exacerbate the impact of the lack of critical market mass....
While the citation specifies Nunavut, I would maintain that it applies equally well to other territories and much of the northern reaches of many provinces. An important realization for all might be that the unintended consequences of directing resources at marginal projects or at initiatives such as greenhouses, or nutrition north Canada's permission of personal orders, might have the unintended negative consequence of further eroding what economies of scale may exist to the detriment of all, for the benefit of the few. This manifests itself as economic leakage from many communities.
The report also highlights the distinct relationship between household income and food security or, inversely, food insecurity. Sample research and evidence point to a strong correlation between income and food security. In their report entitled “Household Food Insecurity in Canada”, Tarasuk and Mitchell report that 60.5% of households citing social assistance as their main source of income experience food security issues, compared with fewer than 12% among those reporting their household income as being derived as wage earners.
The data from Statistics Canada's Canadian community health survey indicates that more than 93% of Nunavut households on social assistance were food insecure. Again, I'm happy to forward this report that I'm citing to the clerk of the committee for the benefit of the members.
While the nutrition north Canada program may affect part of the cost side of the equation, it does nothing to address the lack of scale, nor does it address the most reliable determinant of food security, that being income.
Those of us who have spent time in remote communities recognize that there is a high degree of income disparity and bimodal income distribution that are masked by statistics that cite averages or median levels of household income. In his testimony, I believe Mr. Natan Obed of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami pointed out some of these issues from their research.
I could go on at length, but out of respect for the allotted time I will stop my comments there. During this time we have, we're only going to begin to start to unpack all of the issues surrounding this important topic, but I'll be pleased to try to answer any questions and attempt to provide any clarifications. I will also provide my direct contact information to the clerk of the committee should any of the committee members wish to contact me at a later date.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. That concludes my comments.