Making Food Insecurity a Voting Priority in the Federal Election

April 2025’s federal election pulled voters’ attention in many directions. Through it all, Food Banks Canada and each provincial and territorial food banking association asked people to vote with Canada’s crisis levels of food insecurity in mind and pushed for a government commitment to reduce them by 50% by 2030. “We can’t expect Canada to rise to whatever challenges lie ahead when a quarter of its residents are struggling to meet their basic needs,” we argued together.

Fifty food banks and community organizations amplified this campaign, resulting in over 150,000 visits to its landing page, 5,145 petition signatures and 60 news-media stories highlighting the importance of government action on hunger.

A Solutions-Focused Summit 

In Montreal last summer, Food Banks Canada invited food bankers, academics, decision-makers, Indigenous representatives, food-sector business leaders and people with experience of food insecurity for a first-of-its-kind bilingual summit focused on shaping a unified agenda for addressing food insecurity nationwide. The majority of participants reported that the gathering helped them feel more prepared to implement change in their respective spheres of influence.

“This is a moment of reckoning, a collective call to action,” shared Ardis Proulx-Chedore, manager of the Cochrane Food Bank in Ontario and winner of the 2025 Angela Jones Memorial Award for outstanding achievement in logistics in support of food bank operations. “Here, we’re sharing stories, strategies, and solutions — because hunger doesn’t look the same in every community, but the need for dignity and access is universal.”

A Glimmer of Hope and a Pathway Forward

In September 2025, the third annual Food Banks Canada Poverty Report Card examined financial hardship across the country and the federal government’s efforts to address it. Because of unprecedented levels of poverty and food insecurity, we gave the Government of Canada a D grade for its overall performance. However, easing housing pressures and new social supports, such as the Canadian Dental Care Plan and the National School Food Program, earned it a C for legislative progress.

Besides generating over 1,300 pieces of news coverage and a week of lively discussions in the House of Commons, 2025’s Poverty Report Card ultimately became a factor in the government’s decision to implement one of our top policy recommendations, namely automated tax filing for low-income households with simple tax situations. This policy will ensure that millions of people receive more of the social benefits they’re already entitled to.

LFG! A Rallying Cry for Human Potential 

To elevate the issue of food insecurity and highlight the stakes, Food Banks Canada launched a national awareness campaign in late September 2025 called LFG, which usually means “Let’s Freaking Go” but in this case stands for “Let’s Feed Greatness.” 

The campaign focused on what we all stand to gain by addressing food insecurity and supporting food banks. “When people have enough to eat, possibilities grow, communities strengthen, and we unlock the potential of every person in Canada,” explained CEO Kirstin Beardsley. “By helping each other thrive, we grow ready to face the challenges of today and tomorrow.” 

Released alongside as two major Food Banks Canada research reports, LFG reinforced the human significance of their findings. The campaign’s flagship video has amassed over 8.7 million views and the campaign has reached over 190 million impressions to date.  

LFG is part of a broader project to evolve a cohesive brand that enhances public awareness of food insecurity and food banking in Canada, while inspiring people to contribute to our shared mission.

HungerCount 2025 Showed the Urgency of Bold Legislative Action

Food Banks Canada’s annual HungerCount project tracks and reports on food bank visits and client demographics. In March 2025, there were nearly 2.2 million visits to food banks across Canada — the highest recorded number ever.

During the first five days after the report’s release in October 2025, questions about HungerCount or food banks accounted for 40% of all questions asked during Question Period on Parliament Hill.

“Canada’s HungerCount is growing relentlessly in the wrong direction,” warned Food Banks Canada CEO Kirstin Beardsley. “But we can make new choices. We can turn things around. It starts by feeding greatness and valuing human potential.”

An Advocacy Success Story: The Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit 

In January 2026, Food Banks Canada CEO Kirstin Beardsley was invited to the federal government’s cabinet retreat, where she spoke directly to the Prime Minister and his Cabinet about our practical, evidence-based recommendations aimed at making life more affordable, reducing hunger, and improving systems to remove people from poverty. The following week, the government announced an array of encouraging measures, including a National Food Security Strategy and – to provide immediate relief to struggling people while waiting for the impacts of longer-term policy solutions to take effect – a Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit (GEB).

After several years of advocating for the GEB — including mobilizing over 50,000 advocates through a national petition and a letter‑writing campaign, and working with partners equally committed to ending food insecurity — we welcomed this benefit, which will help low-income households cover essential costs such as food, rent, bills, or childcare. It’s an advance that reflects the collective efforts of food-security advocates from Food Banks Canada, the food bank network and beyond.

Community-Based Research: Food Insecurity Among Employed People

A growing number of people in Canada are participating in the workforce yet struggling to afford food. In fact, according to our latest count, people who have employment as their main source of income now make up 19% of food banks’ clients. Using a community-based research approach, which involves the active participation of those who are most affected by an issue, peer researchers dove into the challenges faced by this group. These include a growing gap between wages and living costs, prohibitive employment-related costs such as commuting and childcare, and a lack of benefits and job security.

Many participants noted they couldn’t access government benefits because they were in a policy “no man’s land” rooted in the outdated assumption that a job guarantees financial stability. These insights – along with participants’ own ideas for policies and programs – will inform our recommendations for governments going forward.

Working With Grocery Stores to Prevent Waste and Relieve Hunger 

Food Banks Canada’s Retail Food Program matches grocery stores across the country with nearby food banks to divert surplus food. This past fiscal year, these arrangements collectively recovered more than 22 million pounds of food from hundreds of store locations. That’s millions of nourishing meals.

“People who need to access our food bank for the first time are always awestruck by the amount and the variety of food, never expecting that we could provide them with fresh produce or frozen meats, or have a such a wide selection of vegetarian products,” says a report from one of the organizations that benefit from these arrangements, the Salvation Army Food Bank in Napanee, Ontario. “The impact on fighting food insecurity in our community is huge.”

Getting Food Donations to Where They’re Needed Most

Three hundred thousand pounds of potatoes. Over 20,000 pounds of rice. Over 160,000 pounds of baby formula. These are just a few recent examples of the large-scale donations that Food Banks Canada receives from farmers, agri-processors, manufacturers and wholesalers and helps to distribute to food banks across the country according to levels of need.  In fiscal year 2025-26, a total of 14.9 million pounds of food reached food banks and their clients this way. Thanks to the generosity of our storage and transportation partners, these shipments are often free of charge.

“These are exactly the kinds of foods everyone needs in their cupboards, and we are all so grateful to have them available to share,” writes Food Banks of Saskatchewan. “It takes all of us together to fight hunger in our communities: we feel the support from near and far.”

From Field to Table 

Many growers across Canada are willing to direct their surplus produce to people in need. However, it’s often easier said than done. Farms and the nearby food banks often lack the resources they’d need to coordinate and act during the short window of time before the food spoils. Plus, the produce is in bulk quantities — more than one food bank could typically give away — and in unpackaged formats that many food banks can’t handle easily, if at all.

Together, Food Banks Canada and the food bank network are addressing these challenges and “unlocking” millions of pounds of agricultural donations. This means developing the capacity to get the food into food-bank-ready formats, distributing it quickly or preserving it for later use, and building relationships with farmers such as Lucas Catalfamo, who donated his surplus apple crops to food banks throughout Ontario last fall. “I think it’s so important that we work together for the greater good,” he said. “Not only to address challenges in food production, but also to strengthen food security for those who are struggling.”

10 Years of Fuelling Childhood Summers 

Many children rely on school-based nutrition programs, but those programs are often closed during the summer months. A decade ago, Food Banks Canada recognized this unmet need and launched our After the Bell program, which provides bags of nutritious, kid-friendly foods for food banks and other community organizations to distribute to kids throughout the summer. 

Thanks to the continued support of our partners and volunteers, After the Bell’s scale has grown more than 300 times bigger since it began. The summer of 2025 saw 215,000 food packs distributed in 235 communities across every province and territory. 

“One parent became visibly moved [upon learning about After the Bell],” reported Feed Nova Scotia, relaying a story from a volunteer. “She expressed surprise that national organizations cared enough to think of her family. And her children’s faces lit up as they opened the colourful packs, especially when they discovered the fresh fruit inside. Moments like this remind us that After the Bell is about joy, and the reassurance that someone is thinking of you.” 

Better Buying 

Food banks wouldn’t be able to operate without generous food donations, but the reality these days is that most of them don’t rely on donations alone. Our research reveals that 95% of food banks had to purchase some of their food last year, spending a median of $70,000. 

That’s why Food Banks Canada’s Marketplace helps food banks stretch their limited budgets. Leveraging the nationwide network’s collective buying power, we negotiate exclusive pricing from reputable vendors and provide a centralized platform where their products are discounted by 25 to 50%. This past fiscal year, food banks used that platform to buy $22.4 million worth of food, household essentials and food banking supplies at discounted prices. 

A Safety Net for Food Banks During Times of Disaster

Food banks are there for families when they fall on hard times. But what happens when an entire community falls on hard times? To help lighten the load on people facing disasters and the food banks serving them, Food Banks Canada has tens of thousands of emergency response food hampers staged in strategic locations throughout the country. The aim of our Emergency Hamper Program is to deliver them within 48 hours of an event and/or through recovery. 

For example, when ice storms caused power outages for nearly a week in parts of Peterborough early 2025, most local food organizations lost all their perishables to spoilage. Many families lost the food in their fridges and freezers as well, increasing the need for food banks at the exact same time they were short on inventory. Food Banks Canada was ready to quickly ship in new food, which was then distributed to food banks, emergency warming shelters, and people’s homes. In total, we dispatched 7,063 emergency food hampers throughout fiscal year 2025-26. 

Growing Capacity

Food Banks Canada’s Capacity program is helping the country’s food banks build the shared systems and infrastructure they need to work together as a network, such as regional solutions for recovering food from farms. 

This fiscal year, to make it possible for food banks to accept and distribute more food — and fresh food in particular  — Food Banks Canada distributed a total of nearly $4.3 million in capacity-building grants to 101 organizations. The much-needed purchases included refrigeration equipment for preserving food, vehicles for transporting it, warehouse equipment for receiving it, shelving for distributing it, and more. Some food banks are building the capacity to grow some of their own food locally, with help from our investments in farming and gardening capacity. 

At the Many Hands Resource Centre in Morden, Manitoba, one of the main refrigerators broke down last year. “We had just received a large donation of dairy products, and I had to stand at the sink pouring all of it away,” reported executive director Mariyam Tsygankova. 
“I realized how many families this food could have nourished, and I felt completely hopeless. Then, only minutes later, I opened my computer and saw that our application for the Capacity Boost Grant had been approved! We were dancing with our staff because it felt like a lifeline had arrived exactly when we needed it most.” 

Tsygankova added that in general, building refrigeration capacity had been transformative for the food bank, allowing it recover and distribute far more food than ever before.  

Reaching Everyone in Need 

Unfortunately, the food bank network isn’t reaching everyone who needs its support. That’s why Food Banks Canada’s Access Grant provided a total of $2.1 million to 89 food banks and community organizations this fiscal year, for improvements that helped dismantle the barriers preventing people from accessing food. Improving access could mean anything from installing a wheelchair ramp to providing home delivery to reaching out to linguistic minorities in their own languages. 

It can also mean addressing the barriers of anxiety, stigma and shame, which is what Whitecourt Interagency Food Bank in Alberta did. By making changes to their client-intake area, they gave people privacy and the ability to talk freely. “One client stated that she was grateful; she had always been fearful about being out in public because she had an abusive ex,” they reported. “She was able to tell us this without fear of being overheard, and we were able to let her know that we could provide a safe space if ever he was around. She no longer has the anxieties she had before about accessing the food bank.” 

The Northern Program 

Over a third of the people living in the territories are experiencing food insecurity, rising to a staggering 62% in Nunavut. The reasons for these crisis levels of hunger include historical injustices, food-shipping challenges, incredibly high grocery prices, and increasingly, climate change. 

Yet, Northerners are incredibly resourceful: many people are developing homegrown solutions such as hunting and harvesting programs, new food banks, elder-nutrition programs, food-buying alliances and more. On an ongoing basis, Food Banks Canada helps food-security champions in the North to fund and implement their solutions, address logistical challenges, supply emergency food, advocate for necessary policy changes, and connect with one another. 

During fiscal year 2025-26, we invested over $4 million in 75 Northern organizations and initiatives that are driving progress toward a region where everyone has access to an adequate amount and quality of food. We also worked with logistics and food partners to expand food shipments to Northern communities, helping to move a total of 140,000 pounds of food into the region. And in the fall of 2025, we hosted two gatherings of Northerners who are addressing hunger in their communities, enabling them to learn from one another and collaborate. 

A Milestone for Excellence in Food Banking 

Three hundred and twenty seven food banks across Canada are now accredited in Food Banks Canada’s Standards of Excellence program. The Standards are a baseline to which the food bank network holds itself accountable in governance and administration, people management, client service and more. 

Although the Standards of Excellence make operations more efficient in the long run, the accreditation process requires work. To support accreditation, we provide manuals, consultations, funds and anything else food banks might need along the way. In fiscal year 2025-26, we awarded $2.1 million in financial support through our Standards of Excellence grants to ensure more food banks can meet the standards. 

Susan Pascoe, executive director of Clarington East Food Bank in Newcastle, Ont., has seen increased donations, easier decision-making and enhanced community trust arising from the accreditation. “[The Standards] push your organization to do better and serve better,” she says. “It makes food banks more transparent, and that’s healthy.” 

Sparking and Spreading Solutions 

For all their differences, food banks across the country often face similar challenges. To help them learn from one another’s experiences and share solutions, Food Banks Canada’s Innovation and Knowledge Sharing program hosts conferences, trainings, and a digital communications platform for food bankers, among other opportunities to exchange knowledge. 

As a new offering this year, we launched FBC Learning Labs, a quarterly series of topics — delivered via webinars, case studies, and other tools and resources — that enable food bankers to learn about promising practices, models, and trends in food banking. 114 people participated in the inaugural unit, which shared instructive examples of mobile food banking. 

Tackling Hunger with Tax Clinics 

Low incomes are at the root of food insecurity, and the government credits and benefits designed to supplement low incomes don’t reach everyone who’s entitled to them. In the spring of 2025, with assistance from free tax clinics based out of food banks, over 21,000 clients activated benefits they may not otherwise have received by filing their income taxes. 

In collaboration with KPMG Canada, Food Banks Canada helped to dispatch experienced volunteer tax preparers to eight primary clinics. We also awarded 20 grants to strengthen pre-existing tax clinics. Together, the 28 sites put a total of $113.8 million into the pockets of food bank clients. “’Julia,’ a senior, and her son had not filed their taxes in over three years,” reported Unison at Kerby Centre in Calgary, one of the primary sites. “Without any T-slips and unsure of where to begin, they felt overwhelmed.” Thanks to the clinic, they claimed “a life-changing amount that brought immediate financial relief. This experience gave them a renewed sense of hope and stability.” 

Addressing Period Poverty 

Choosing between menstrual health and adequate nutrition is not a choice anyone should be forced to make, yet food banks see this reality every day. In 2023, Women and Gender Equality Canada (WAGE) selected Food Banks Canada to lead the Menstrual Equity Fund pilot project. Together, we distributed over 124 million menstrual products to over 6 million people with low incomes throughout Canada. This total includes 40 million menstrual products in fiscal year 2025-26.

Accessing menstrual products helps people stay in work and at school, preventing setbacks that can have lasting social and economic impacts. “One family had three menstruating daughters, and the cost per month was often unmanageable,” reported the Peter McKee Community Centre in Moncton. “The mother informed one of the volunteers that one daughter had missed a week of school because there wasn’t money to purchase these products. This program has had a greater impact than we could have imagined.” 

Feeding Schoolkids’ Potential 

Thanks to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Food Banks Canada’s School Food Infrastructure Fund was able to invest $1.6 million this year in the infrastructure and equipment that food banks and other community nonprofits need to support or deliver school food programs. We granted the funds to a total of 24 organizations that used them to increase their capacity to provide food to local school programs, improve the availability of nutritious and culturally appropriate foods in those programs, and expand their reach and impact. 

For example, Moisson Outaouais in Quebec used a Food Banks Canada School Food Infrastructure Fund grant to expand an existing school-lunch partnership into three new schools, allowing it to reach around 300 additional kids every weekday. “The young people are eating better and concentrating better,” reported one of the participating schools, l’École Côte-du-Nord. “The impact is really visible in the day-to-day.”