‘Unprecedented’: Monthly Food Bank Use in Canada Reaches Record 2 Million Visits

Boxes wait to be filled with provisions at the Daily Bread Food Bank warehouse in Toronto on March 18, 2020. The Canadian Press/Chris Young

Canada saw record food bank use in 2024, with a high of over 2 million food bank visits in March, says a Food Banks Canada report.

Food bank usage has risen 90 percent since 2019, according to HungerCount 2024, which tracked trends among the country’s 5,500 food banks and community organizations.

The report said one-in-five Canadians who use food banks are employed, while 33 percent of clients are children, 40 percent are on social assistance or disability support, and 32 percent are newcomers to Canada. The report also found that 7.7 percent of those accessing food banks are seniors, whose proportion of food bank usage has “increased significantly compared to before the pandemic.”

“Food bank visits in March 2024 are at an unprecedented level, surpassing even last year’s record-breaking number,” the report said. “This record level of usage is consistent with record high rates of food insecurity and reflects findings from other recent studies showing greater numbers of people experiencing economic hardship.”

By province, Prince Edward Island saw the largest increase in food bank visits compared to 2023 (29 percent), followed by Nova Scotia (21 percent), British Columbia (15 percent), Ontario (8 percent), New Brunswick (7.7 percent) and Quebec (5.6 percent). Several provinces saw food bank usage slightly decrease, with Alberta decreasing nearly 1 percent, Manitoba decreasing by more than 3 percent, Saskatchewan decreasing by 5 percent, and Newfoundland decreasing by nearly 8 percent.

The report also found close to 30 percent of food banks have reported running out of food as they struggle to deal with food and housing inflation.

 The “unthinkable rate of growth” of food bank usage in not sustainable, Food Banks Canada CEO Kirstin Beardsley said in a press release. Beardsley said all levels of government need to introduce policies to support Canadians, specifically low-income workers, single adults, renters, and northern communities.

Canada has been experiencing a cost-of-living crisis in recent years due to the combined factors of inflation, higher food and housing costs, higher interest rates, and lower overall productivity. Canada’s inflation rate rose from 2.2 percent in March 2021 to a peak of 8.1 percent in June 2022, causing the Bank of Canada to subsequently raise interest rates from 0.25 percent in March 2022 to a peak of 5 percent in July 2023.

The higher interest rates managed to bring inflation down closer to the Bank of Canada’s target, with September 2024’s inflation numbers sitting at just 1.6 percent, allowing the Bank to further decrease interest rates to 3.75 percent in October. Prices for food and housing have remained elevated despite the change.

Several food banks told The Epoch Times in May they were forced to ration their dwindling supplies of food. “The surpluses and the reserves that we might have been able to accumulate are being used up very quickly, and it is impacting things like hamper size,” Food Banks Alberta executive director Shawna Bissell said.

Meanwhile, many banks saw a decrease in food donations from individual donors and corporations in recent years, forcing them to dip into their cash reserves and purchase food directly. Dan Huang-Taylor, executive director at Food Banks B.C., said 107 different food banks across the province had reported this trend.