Mr. Speaker, I am happy to take this opportunity to revisit my question about the barriers to nutritionally adequate food faced by northern and aboriginal peoples across Canada.
As I have said before, the government must consider a national food strategy to combat the growing issue of food insecurity. At the time of my question, the UN rapporteur on the right to food finished his visit to Canada and expressed concern that we were not meeting our obligations under the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which we signed in 2010, by the way. He has since delivered his report to the UN Human Rights Council with a similar message.
The inaccessibility of nutritious, culturally appropriate and sustainably developed food is a problem that disproportionately affects aboriginal and northern communities in Canada. There are a number of factors that limit one's ability to acquire this food. One of the major factors is income. We know that more than 20% of aboriginal people fall below the Statistics Canada low-income cutoff rate. By way of comparison, only 11% of the rest of our population shares this circumstance.
Therefore, we see how the factors that affect one's ability to purchase food are disproportionately felt among Canada's aboriginal population. This is reflected in the 2007-2008 Inuit health survey by the Centre for Indigenous Peoples' Nutrition and Environment, which demonstrated that 70% of adults living in Nunavut are food insecure. These are some of the highest figures among all developed nations.
These figures demonstrate that federal programs, like nutrition north Canada, which are aimed at addressing this issue, could be improved. The program's lack of transparency makes it impossible for observers to see if subsidies directed to food suppliers are actually being passed along to consumers. Ultimately, what is happening is that food costs in northern Canada continue to rise, despite a federal program designed to address the phenomenon. Nutrition north Canada also dismisses the reality that some of the best and most nutritious food consumed by aboriginal peoples is available through traditional means, hunting and fishing.
However, we have to remember that this is not an issue limited to aboriginal peoples but is increasingly faced by more and more Canadians. Since the 1980s, we have witnessed food banks become permanent fixtures across the country. What were once emergency assistance measures were used by more than three-quarters of a million Canadians in March of this year alone. Almost 40% of those were children. However, food banks have little or no government funding and are chronically understaffed. We must commend the organizations and civic-minded volunteers whose hard work is all that stands before people having to make difficult choices, like between paying rent and buying good nutritious food.
While the Conservative government does little to address the problem of food insecurity, volunteers and organizations across Canada, like the Elliot Lake food bank, continue to work hard to help Canadian families struggling with the unacceptable choices I mentioned. These organizations are a part of the solution but are not equipped to address a food crisis of this magnitude. Canada prides itself on being among the most developed nations. The government has a role to play to ensure that the most vulnerable in our population have access to nutritious and culturally appropriate food.
The UN report on the right to food highlights some practical ways we can address the issue of food insecurity facing too many Canadians. As the report notes, we have to encourage the federal, provincial and territorial governments to meet with aboriginal groups to discuss access to land and natural resources and how this affects nutrition north Canada and the right to food.
We see far too often that people are left without food. When will the government start talking about these issues? How many more people have to go without adequate food before we start developing a national food strategy?