Although inflation and rising food prices have made costs for many school food programs across Canada – including those in Lambton County – almost untenable in recent years, the possibility the federal government will earmark $1 billion towards food for students in their next budget brings hope to those advocating for a universal, national and free healthy food program for kids.
So said Debbie Field, co-ordinator for the national Coalition for Healthy School Food and Leslie Palimaka, local co-ordinator of the Ontario School Nutrition program for the Victorian Order of Nurses (VON) Lambton, during a Feb. 7 presentation to the Golden K Kiwanis Club of Sarnia-Lambton, a service club that volunteers in several area schools preparing, picking up and distributing food to students.
Field, whose organization represents over 240 non-profit organizations advocating for a pan-Canadian school food program, said Canada ranks near the bottom of the table when it comes to industrialized countries providing healthy food for its youth. A recent UNICEF study showed Canada finish in 37th place among 41 countries in that regard.
“Canada is a bit alone in the world,” she said. “It is without a harmonized program, it’s the only G7 member without a national school food program … and (food programming) only reaches a small percentage of our students here.
“And it’s across the board … research also shows that the diet quality of Canadian children across the socio-economic spectrum is poor.”
Positive benefits of students having access to healthy school food programs have been well-documented around the world, Field said.
“Improving children’s access to healthy food has widespread benefits for physical and mental health, social cohesion and school performance,” she told Kiwanis members. “Where there’s a school food program, it’s just a better school … and school programs have a positive impact on students, families and communities.”
Making the program universal – available to all students – is vitally important Field said, as it reduces stigma.
“It’s about all children having access to healthy food … and it’s about universal access,” she said. “According to research, most kids won’t go into ‘the poor kids’ lunchroom.”
The good news, Field said, was that both the federal Liberals and New Democrats both pledged $1 billion over five years towards food for children during their 2021 election platforms, while the Bloc Quebecois agreed in principle with the concept, so long as the provinces could manage the funds. After an advocacy campaign which included reaching out to elected officials, encouraging community members to write to their MPs and an extensive media campaign, she hopes that the Liberals will include the promised money in their next budget, scheduled later this year.
The Coalition for Healthy School Food is hoping to get three items from the feds: for the promised funding to be implemented as soon as possible; for the government to enter into discussions with Indigenous leaders to create their own separate program; and that support would be given to improve school food infrastructure, which would enhance capacity and in turn save money for all programs.
“We probably need $1 billion a year,” Field said. “But if we get (the $1 billion over five years), this will help programs like Leslie’s get much needed support.”
Palimaka, who co-ordinates Lambton County’s Ontario Student Nutrition Program as a member of the VON, one of the lead agencies for the program, said that during the past year, over 500 volunteers have provided 1.3 million healthy snacks to 9,974 children across 43 schools in the county.
It takes approximately a dollar a day to provide healthy food for students, Palimaka said, and provincial government funding currently only provides 12 cents per student, meaning that schools must rely on donations, fundraising efforts and partnerships with both provincial and local partners such as the United Way of Sarnia-Lambton, Noelle’s Gift, unions, service clubs, Toonies for Tummies and Bluewater Power to fill the gap.
“I first got involved in 2006 when we had 22 school programs,” Palimaka said. “Back then we received 11 cents per student per day, now we’re up to 12 cents per student per day.
“The cost of food has gone way up and it’s extremely difficult for schools to fundraise when there are so many competing interests.”
Healthy food programs look different in each school across the county, Palimaka said, but they are tailor-made to suit the needs of each individual school’s population.
“It can be in a bin in the classroom, it can be grab’n’go in high schools … what’s important is that (the students) have access to nutritious food.”
Following the presentation, Palimaka said federal funding would make a big difference for programs here in Lambton County.
“Federal funding would be very welcome to the student nutrition program,” she said. “It would mean that schools could purchase more fruits and vegetables, which is the mandate of the program, and alleviate a little bit of the fundraising burden on schools, because we know that schools need to fundraise to support a dollar a day (per student ). And while the provincial government funding is wonderful, it’s not enough. So having the federal government add even a few pennies would make a difference to programs.”
“The provincial program offers stability, but it doesn’t offer sustainability,” Palimaka added. “And schools need to have sustainability every year in order to purchase the number of fruits and vegetables they need. At this point, schools can’t possibly buy everything that they’re supposed to buy – the money just isn’t there. They can’t fundraise for it, there’s minimal ministry funding, everybody is pitching in from all sides, but at the end of the day there’s still a shortfall.”
Palimaka also took time to thank Kiwanis members and other volunteers for helping the school programs run smoothly.
“It really comes down to volunteers, or a lack of volunteers,” she said. “It’s not that schools don’t want to participate but look at the manpower an organization like Kiwanis provides, teams of people need to be going to schools to do things like cut and bag vegetables.”
“I believe we have about 500 volunteers … and the number is probably higher than that. Shopping, delivery, fundraising, food prep, cleanup and the social time with students, which is something they really enjoy,” Palimaka added. “We’re always looking for volunteers…and if people reach out, we’ll find a school that’s a good fit for them.”
For more information about volunteering, contact Leslie Palimaka at [email protected].