Food insecurity, mental health impacts challenge rural B.C. communities during wildfires: report

“Limited cellular coverage, unreliable internet service and power outages can also delay warnings and timely access to information, further intensifying these risks.”

The human rights commissioner also says wildfires put infrastructure systems such as communications, energy, food distribution, health care and transportation in rural communities at risk.

Relating to food distribution, Lower Nicola Indian Band Councillor Sue Sterling-Bur told the report wildfires can create uncertainty.

“At that point, we were worried about food and where we were going to get food,” Sterling-Bur says, “because the grocery stores were all closed. Kamloops was cleared out. Kelowna was cleared out. It was really bad. I remember going through everything we had in this house… I figured we had 21 days… I never had to do that before in my life.

“We had no access to many of our foods for hunting, fishing, berry picking… It impacted being able to come together collectively as a nation and support one another through the trauma. Mental health just skyrocketed with really challenging mental health situations.”

However, the report noted some communities have found ways to mitigate food insecurity and instability through local systems. Ashcroft Mayor Barbara Roden told the report how proximity to regional food producers helps her residents during wildfire events.

“We’re very fortunate in our area that we do have places like Desert Hills. We have Horstings Farm Market to the north near Cache Creek. We’ve got Hilltop Gardens down at Spences Bridge. So, these are all people who grow fantastic produce right in our neighbourhood. It’s readily available. It’s inexpensive.”

The report adds wildfires also affect mental health, as the prospect or experience of displacement, property loss and fear for loved ones can create immediate long-term psychological harm. Roden says while no Ashcroft residents lost homes during the wildfire that swept through the Village of Lytton in 2021, they “all know people who did.”

While the report notes wildfires are an important part of healthy lands, waters and communities across B.C., they have become larger, more severe and more disruptive over the last two decades. The report notes the average annual area burned has increased tenfold from 867 square kilometres per year from 2000 to 2004, to 9,863 square kilometres from 2020 to 2024.

The full report can be found here.

by Aaron Schulze

Food insecurity, mental health impacts challenge rural B.C. communities during wildfires: report

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