New stats from Oxford's Social Planning Council on the issue of Food Security shows around 30% of those visiting organizations like the Salvation Army and Operation Sharing are under the age of 18.

Social Planning Coordinator Ashley Farrar says it's a major concern. "We know that children who grow up living in poverty, their brain develops differently. Not having access to healthy food, and needing to access emergency food providers, that is really concerning. Their brain is going to develop differently and that is going to last for their lifetime."

... Many pediatricians with community practices tell us that finding the money to feed their children is the top problem faced by many parents they meet.

We see children whose parents struggle with poverty. We admit proportionately more children from high poverty neighbourhoods to hospital than from other neighbourhoods, and the children from poorer neighbourhoods stay in the hospital longer.

We know that childhood hunger - which of course is linked to poverty - has long-term impacts on physical and mental health.

In the fight against poverty, charity, while helping those in need, can also let government off the hook. The reasons are many - recessions, rapidly changing globalized labour markets, growing income inequality, the Harris government's assault on social assistance rates and the McGuinty government's complacency with these rates - but the fact is that we have growing numbers of people facing poverty here in our community.

And Canada boasts the second-largest non-profit and voluntary sector in the world. (The Netherlands is first; the United States is fifth.)

Charities have become an integral part of our economy, and the frayed patchwork fabric that comprises Canada's social safety net.

"Hunger is a symptom of poverty. And poverty is about low income," he said.

It was a laudable decision, even though the hourly increase to $10.25 from $6.85 was too little to raise full-time low-earning workers above the poverty line.

When I started there, it was about 700 people .. or 700 households .. once a week. When I left, it was 5,000 twice a week.

Regardless of the solution, this is the right discussion to be having.

The fact that you can't eat healthy is ultimately going to lead to illness ... period. I mean there's no two ways about it. People in poverty are sick ... a lot more than the general population.

The fact that you're spending so much time scavenging for food eats into the time that should be productively used to find a job or, you know, something that makes you feel better, better mentally and contributing something to society rather than falling deeper into the poverty pit.

"Holy crow, does he get it," says Graves. "He gets it in the big picture and gets in the small picture, and he's definitely the wave of the future."

Taylor is quick to acknowledge, and he respects, the moral imperative that people feel to help out in whatever way they can. But hunger is not an issue for charity, he says, and he and others at the Downtown Eastside Neighbourhood House are "not here to convince people of deservedness."

"Food," says Taylor, "is a fundamental human right."

Building bigger, more efficient food banks may temporarily feed more hungry people, but they won't end hunger and they won't prevent the users of this system from feeling like second-class citizens in a first-class world.

It is in this latter capacity that he came to make some closing remarks at a recent conference on welfare reform, held in Oakville.

McMeekin took the podium to a smattering of polite applause, but before he had a chance to say how happy he was to be there, someone in the audience yelled at him: "Reject austerity."

If you did -- and even, or especially, if you didn't for lack of physical or economic access to food -- you should know that behind closed doors sits a group of industry leaders claiming to be non-partisan, objective, independent and representative. They are hammering out a national food strategy for Canada.

On April 9 and 10, the Conference Board of Canada hosted their 2nd Canadian Food Summit in Toronto, an event focusing on, in their own words, "constructive ways to make the most of our opportunities, resources and talent to achieve the great economic potential of the food sector and meet the full range of Canadians' food needs."

Hamel made the opening remarks at a recent conference in Halton region, where changes to provincial welfare rates were up for discussion...

"Imagine for a minute that you have an infection and go to see the doctor. The doctor tells you that you need 10 mL. of an antibiotic for 15 days to clear up the infection completely."

"He then prescribes you 5 mL. for 10 days. Sure, you might feel better a bit, but there is no doubt that you will need to be back for ongoing refills of the antibiotic."

"We would never run our health-care system this way and I struggle to understand why we are using this approach to tackle poverty."

Our food system is broken.

Farmers are now making less money off their farms than they did during the Great Depression. Our national food guide tells us to load up on fruit and vegetables, but we don’t grow them any more - 80 per cent of produce is imported. Just four companies control more than 70 per cent of food sales in the country! Around 2.5 million Canadians are constantly hungry, and a quarter of us are obese. Canada is the only G8 country without a nationally funded school meal plan ...

Jennefer Laidley of the Income Security Advocacy Centre discussed a recently-released Commission for the Review of Social Assistance report at a poverty reduction forum hosted at the Oakville Conference Centre by the Halton Poverty Roundtable.

... The most staggering realization is that most of the people profiled in the film are working yet still don’t make enough to buy groceries to last them the month due to the rising cost of healthy food in a country where there’s more than enough healthy food to go around. As a result, many families rely on low cost, low nutrition food that affects their weight (who would think that the obesity epidemic could be related to hunger?) or they just don’t eat more than once a day.

The difference? Everything.

From a single-staff operation handing out canned food to those in need, The Table has become a bustling hive of healthy food, community building and empowerment.

This is what the reimagined food "centre" in Perth looks like: Dads and their kids invade the community kitchen on Tuesday evenings to learn basic cooking skills and share the meal they’ve prepared together. On Thursday mornings, pregnant and new moms and their partners cook, eat and share perinatal care and nutrition advice. There may be an after-school group in the herb garden out back, or an advocacy workshop on how to organize for social change around issues from affordable housing to improved public transit.

1. What has happened to make economic inequality relevant in Canadian history? ...

2. To what degree has a commitment to social justice been significant in creating Canada today? ...

It isn't that she has things to hide. She lives her life in the open; too much in the open.

May lives in her car.

It is an old sedan. It is crammed with her stuff. She used to have a place to live. The fact that she does not have another is a failure of the larger imagination of all the helping professions.

We met recently in Newmarket. That's not her town. She drove there for a meeting about poverty.

Food security is obtained when every person in a community has access to safe and nutritious food that meets their health and cultural needs. Without everyone having equal access in a dignified manner, food security does not exist.

As an example, having access to the food bank does not translate to equal access to food. Although food banks are doing their best, they are not a sustainable option, and cannot possibly provide safe, nutritious food to meet the health and cultural needs of everyone at their doorstep. A better strategy would be to work toward poverty prevention.

No, not one of the traditional unions like the Canadian Auto Workers, who were recruiting among United Church ministers a while back. The union I want to join is The Union of Food Bank and Emergency Meal Program Volunteers. Sponsored by the York Region Food Network, they have a great web site at www.freedom90.ca. Check it out.

The UFBEMPV (now doesn't that just roll off the tongue?) has no union dues. As volunteers at food banks and emergency meal programs, members have already paid their dues.

Many other marginalized groups also experience higher levels of food insecurity. 50% of households in receipt of social assistance were food insecure. Across the country social assistance rates are insufficient to cover basic necessities, and the high cost of housing in Canada forces many to go hungry and become reliant on food banks just to make ends meet. 2012 calculations reported that a record 882,000 people in Canada used food banks each month. Of particular concern is the severe food insecurity faced by Aboriginal peoples and immigrants across Canada.

The report expressed concern about the discrepancy between Canada's international human rights commitments and its domestic human rights, and encouraged policy makers to develop a national food strategy that addresses economic and social barriers.

Out of a population of just over 34 million, De Schutter estimates as many as one million Canadian households - or 4.3 million people - are food insecure.

Since food is that important to the current federal government, I wonder what Mr. Fantino and his cabinet colleagues think about this week's release from the UN's rapporteur on Canada's declining food security. Actually, we already know the answer to that. Back in May, when the UN's right-to-food envoy, Olivier De Schutter, toured Canada for 11 days, he was publicly mocked by a number of cabinet ministers.

His efforts to assess the country's ability to provide food to the marginalized were belittled by the likes of Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney as "patronizing" and "completely ridiculous". For many citizens it was an occasion of national embarrassment and international humiliation.

Throughout the 21-page report, De Schutter also takes direct aim at some of the core items of the federal government's agenda, saying they undermine access to food.

These include the controversial decision to cancel the long-form census in 2009, the ongoing Canada-EU free trade negotiations, the scrapping of the Canadian Wheat Board, and how Ottawa oversees the money it transfers to the provinces for social services.

Their stories are interwoven with insights from experts including sociologist Janet Poppendieck, author Raj Patel and nutrition policy leader Marion Nestle; ordinary citizens like Pastor Bob Wilson and teachers Leslie Nichols and Odessa Cherry; and activists such as Witness to Hunger's Mariana Chilton, Top Chef's Tom Colicchio and Oscar®-winning actor Jeff Bridges.

Ultimately, A Place at the Table shows us how hunger poses serious economic, social and cultural implications for our nation, and that it could be solved once and for all, if the American public decides-as they have in the past-that making healthy food available and affordable is in the best interest of us all.

...

The national web-based Conversation between the Special rapporteur and organizations across the country will take place at noon (EST) on March 4 in English and March 5 in French. Communities are gathering in food banks, universities, offices, town halls and other places to participate in the event. The rapporteur will present his report, followed by a period of questions and comments from the audience, and most community events will then host a local discussion around what can be done to improve respect for food in their communities.

As the UK's Conservative led coalition government strives to reduce public expenditure, cuts in the welfare budget are likely to force more UK citizens to fall back on food banks to meet their nutritional needs. Just a few years ago food banks were virtually unknown in the UK. But, since the banking collapse and the financial tsunami of 2008 left in their wake what some economists believe is a triple dip recession, The Independent reports the use of food banks in the UK is up 1000%.

The UK's growing food poverty crisis has now come to the notice of Olivier de Schutter, the UN's Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food. In 2012, as reported in the National Post, Mr. De Schutter received a barrage of criticism from the Canadian politicians after he'd accused the Canadian government of a failure to ensure food security for thousands of its poorest citizens. Today, Mr de Schutter has the UK's Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition firmly in his sights.

"This report echoes many of the concerns our members have had for years," Diana Bronson, executive director of the NGO, said in a press release...

The U.N. special rapporteur released a twenty-one page report on food security in Canada last December, and the report will be formally presented to the U.N. Council on Human Rights in Geneva March 4.

Strangely enough, it’s one policy area on which all three parties could reach significant agreement without much effort. A reform package would be hard for any party to refuse on its merits if it simplified administration, cut a bunch of rules, and reduced clawbacks.

More than half of the faces flowing through the doors of Community Care of St. Catharines and Thorold around back-to-school time were kids, said executive director Betty-Lou Souter. All in all, 53% of their clients were children. The normal ratio is 38%.

And yet, Niagara's not alone, says a report from the Conference Board of Canada. Among 17 compared nations, Canada ranks a dismal 15th in child poverty and working-age poverty alike.

Faith in Action are advocating for the elimination of food banks within their community. Having volunteered at the food bank for years, their members are now calling for long-term, sustainable solutions to the problem of hunger and are challenging all levels of government to rebuild Canada’s social safety net and end systemic poverty.

And yet, those in the know say in excess of 5,000 people in Belleville - more than 10,000 in Quinte - do not have access to enough safe, affordable and nutritious food.

This is not a shame; this is a tragedy.

"Some people think it's more connected to food safety but, actually, food security means that all people have access to enough safe, affordable and nutritious food without social or economic barriers," stated Cathy McCallum, chair of the Food Security Network.

Wilmot was excited to tell her about the Good Food Box program, a $6 hamper of affordable produce sourced from local farmers. "We started bringing in sample boxes, showing people what they could get," she says.

The woman seemed interested, but when she found out the price of the fresh kale, squash and root vegetables, she said she simply couldn't afford it.

"She said, 'I get $610 a month, and my rent is $640. There's nothing left over. In fact, I still have to scramble to figure out how I can make up the difference,'" Wilmot says.

Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak, seen, centre, in this file photo, has released a new policy paper on welfare reform.

Tim Hudak also called for welfare recipients to be given food cards, similar to bank cards pre-loaded with cash, for a portion of their benefits “to make sure the dollars are going toward their intended purpose” and as an anti-fraud measure.