In the wake of the chaos caused by COVID-19, more Canadians than ever before are having trouble meeting their basic food needs, according to Food Banks Canada’s annual HungerCount report. Despite being the 10th wealthiest nation in the world whose billionaire class grew their profits by $78 billion since the beginning of the pandemic, Canada saw its citizens visit food banks more than a million times in March 2021 alone, an increase of 20 per cent from the same time in 2019. Although COVID-19 certainly acted as a catalyst, the report found this unprecedented wave of need is the result of numerous, longstanding failures by the government and clear evidence of a system in decline.
In their report, Food Banks Canada identifies three factors contributing to the increased need for food assistance. The first is the soaring cost of food itself. Driven by supply line issues, environmental factors such as droughts and fires, and general inflation, food prices in Canada went up by three per cent in 2020 and are on track to rise a further five per cent by the end of 2021. On a global level, reports are that food prices have hit a 10-year high, in no small part due to buyers hoarding items such as dairy products to secure their private supply. While the pandemic has aggravated the issue, food inflation has outpaced median income in Canada for some time now and shows no signs of slowing down whether there is a pandemic or not.
The second factor is housing, with 46 per cent of Canadians now saying that escalating rent, home costs, and utilities are their largest obstacle to affording food—an increase of 21 per cent from the year before. Those in the lowest income bracket are now estimated to be spending more than half of their pay on housing, considered “crisis level” even in a capitalist society. As their landlords reap record profits, poor and working class Canadians are forced to choose between a hot meal and a warm bed.
Lastly, the amount paid out to those living on social assistance has been kept indefensibly low for decades. More than half of those who used food banks so far in 2021 were receiving help from one of these programs. While every province has different criteria and standards for welfare and disability, inflation has gradually eroded the real dollar value provided by them to the point that a single person on one of these social assistance programs must subsist far below the poverty line.
With this data, Food Banks Canada identified two trends in growing food bank use. The first is a dramatic increase in urban centres, identified as areas with populations of 100,000 or more, where 21 per cent of respondents identified a lack of work as the reason they visited a food bank. Initially thought to be a result of the “economic shock” of the first COVID-19 lockdowns when three million Canadians lost their jobs overnight, the demand has not let up even as the country gradually lurches back to life.
The second trend takes place on a longer timeline but is no less dire. Seniors and people with disabilities have watched the cost of living climb year over year while the payments they receive from their pensions or disability do not. In smaller centres and rural areas, 31.5 per cent of respondents in rural areas relied on a fixed income to get by, a three per cent increase from 2019 and an almost 10 per cent increase over 2010 when the country was struggling to recover from the 2008 Recession. This inequity has been building for decades, as Canada leaves behind those it no longer considers productive.
The HungerCount report presents a number of reforms the government could introduce to handle food insecurity, such as a national rent support program or expanding coverage from Employment Insurance. But none of these reforms can halt inflation, cool the housing market, or eliminate the economic shocks that send people into poverty. It is the capitalist system itself that is at the root of these problems. Even in the absence of crisis, the commodification of basic human needs such as food and shelter means that they will always be out of reach for some members of society. That, combined with inflation and the gutting of social supports, has created what Food Banks Canada calls a “perfect storm” of inequality. In reality, regardless of whether a global pandemic heightens the process, crises like this are inevitable in a capitalist society. And more are sure to come. The only way to eliminate the want and suffering that comes along with these crises is to eliminate capitalism.
Canadians do not need more stop-gap solutions to prop up a failing system. They require a complete change in the logic of society. Capitalism creates poverty for the masses as much as it creates wealth for the select few; the two outputs are inseparable. Only a socialist transformation of society can ensure all people are housed and fed, and only a working class movement can bring that transformation about.
