In partnership with Metro Ontario, One More Bite provides food banks in Ontario with the opportunity to receive rescued fresh food from their local Metro-banner grocery stores to distribute to adults and children living with hunger in their communities. Following a successful pilot, in 2019-20 we began a phased roll out of the program in more than 30 communities across the province. Over the next year we will continue to expand the number of food banks and stores participating in this ground-breaking food rescue program.

• 34 food banks rescued food
• 157 Metro and Food Basics stores donated to food banks
• 1,099,585 pounds of food rescue

Supported by:  

The Capacity Building Program provides food banks in Ontario with funding to grow their capacity to accept, store, and distribute fresh food to adults and children living with hunger.

• 6 food banks participated
• 11 pieces of equipment purchased
• 14,410 clients benefited

Supported by:

Taking place every September, Hunger Action Month is an Ontario initiative, now run nationally in partnership with Food Banks Canada, which encourages people to work towards a future without hunger through four key actions: educate, advocate, volunteer, and donate. In 2019, we:

• Educate: Created  customizable tools for food banks to share statistics on hunger and poverty in their communities, and promoted Food Banks Canada’s Impossible Choices
• Advocate: Sent 15,000 postcards to MPPs opposing proposed changes to social assistance and demonstrating the impact that would have on food bank clients
• Volunteer: Highlighted the stories of some of the incredible volunteers that make food banks possible
• Donate: Raised $120,000 to help end hunger in Ontario

Sponsors:

Feed Ontario’s annual 2019 Hunger Report found that, despite the province’s low unemployment rate, Ontario’s food banks continue to see increasingly high levels of use, and that there is an emerging trend in the number of individuals with employment income that require the support of a food bank to make ends meet. Key highlights of the report include:

• 27% increase over the last three years in the proportion of adults with employment income accessing Ontario’s food banks
• 88% increase in the proportion of food bank clients with a recent job loss
• Only 28% of unemployed Ontarians are receiving support from Employment Insurance

Read Hunger Report

In October 2019, Feed Ontario released a new report, The Cost of Poverty in Ontario, which examined the relationship between poverty, poor health, the justice system, and lost productivity and made the economic case that investing in people by reducing poverty is not only socially responsible, but financially sound. The report found:

• Poverty related expenses is costing Ontario an estimated at $27.1 – $33 billion per year
• The poverty rate for unattached adults and families without children increased by 24% between 2012-2015
• The introduction of the Ontario Child Benefit resulted in a 24% reduction in child poverty and a 37% reduction in the number of children living in deep poverty between 2012-2015, making a strong case for investments in innovative solutions, like a basic income program, to address poverty in Ontario

Read the Cost of Poverty