On Thursday, November 30, 2017, the Nipissing Area Food Roundtable hosted an event called the Hungry for Change: Food Insecurity Forum.

About 60 community members from various organizations attended and there was much discussion related to why an income solution is required to truly address food insecurity.

The panel of local speakers from St. Andrew’s Church, the Nipissing Community Legal Clinic, the Gathering Place and the North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit discussed food insecurity from a local perspective and several guest speakers made the trip to North Bay to share their expertise related to food insecurity.

Before leaving, participants were asked to identify areas of interest for future direction for the Nipissing Area Food Roundtable related to food insecurity. The top three items included:

  1. Events or initiatives related to income advocacy leading up to the 2018 provincial election
  2. Implementing the Cent$less Campaign in the Nipissing Area
  3. Hosting more community events about food insecurity

The Nipissing Area Food Roundtable will look forward to working on these initiatives in the New Year.

A big thank you to the North Bay Discovery Museum for hosting us, Cecil’s Brewhouse and Kitchen for catering a great lunch with some local foods incorporated, and Dirty Girls Farm for donating soaps for our speakers gifts.

Media Coverage:

http://www.nugget.ca/2017/12/01/food-banks-soup-kitchens-not-solving-food-insecurity-problem—panel

http://northernontario.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=1274893 

Speaker Presentations:

Dr. Valerie Tarasuk – University of Toronto Understanding Food Insecurity

  • Visit PROOF for more information about why an income solution is required to truly address food insecurity http://proof.utoronto.ca/

Joseph Leblanc – Social Planning Council of Sudbury Decolonizing the Table Empowering Household Food Sovereignty

Carolyn Doris- Peterborough County Public Health – Nourish Project

  • Visit https://nourishproject.ca/ for more information about the programs and initiatives offered through Nourish

Kendra Patrick- North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit – Cent$less Campaign

Cent$less videos: