Vision for a Hunger-Free Community

What the past year, and past decade, has shown us about food insecurity in our city.

This past year has continued to challenge Calgarians from all sides. There is increasing demand month over month, year over year. Those who are accessing food support have finally exhausted all their resources. Many are still unemployed or underemployed. The economic upheaval continues to impact so many lives, in so many ways. Social, cultural, and environmental challenges are manifesting in a city that has not seemed to catch a break since 2008’s global financial meltdown and the subsequent 2015 Alberta downturn.

Although this has been the dominant theme for the past few years, the prevailing resilient attitude from clients, donors and partners is undeniable. From conversation to connection, clients are leaving with heads held high – their families are being fed and they now have resources to help navigate their current situation. Calgarians support their fellow Calgarians with generous donations to ensure their neighbours in need have quality food to help them through their crisis.

There has been a greater awareness of the scope and impact of our programs and services. We can demonstrate that we do more than just provide food; our programming changes lives through specialized hampers, food sharing, and connections to services. The collective impact of food and community is no less than lifesaving. We have found that the sooner we connect people to services that address the root cause of their crisis, the sooner the healing and recovery can begin. When clients take advantage of our proven partners’ programs, we can report that the need for emergency food hampers decreases. We can also confirm that people are on the road to resiliency, with 26 per cent of hamper recipients reporting wages rather than assistance programs as their primary income.

We are community owned and community supported and we take the stewarding of all donations, large or small, by the tin or the truckload, very seriously.

Please take a moment to read our annual report to see the full extent of the impact we had in the past year.