Image Credit: Mount Paul Community Food Centre

By Silvia Senna

FOOD CENTRE

Kamloops food centre offers help as millions of families report food insecurity due to high inflation

Nov 25, 2023 | 12:19 PM

KAMLOOPS — According to Statistics Canada, about seven million Canadians have reported food insecurity in the past year due to the high cost of living – and Kamloops residents are not immune to that.

The Mount Paul Community Food Centre (CFC) said they have seen an increase of people accessing their food programs, with nearly 1,000 local residents visiting the facility every week.

“Because it’s harder and harder to make ends meet right now, we’re seeing an increase of people coming in, and some of those people are not in the same target population that we’ve previously seen,” said Dawn Christie, Mount Paul CFC Manager.

The non-profit organization’s main goal is to ensure access to healthy whole foods for their community members. With that in mind, CFC welcomes individuals to enjoy a healthy lunch – free of charge – every Monday and Thursday at noon.

“Our centre is open to those in need of food access, and we have resources available here. Any community member can access our programs in their food security journey with no associated cost, as many times as they require,” said Christie.

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The Centre also operates a produce market every Tuesday and Thursday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., where produce can be purchased at a discounted rate. They offer over a dozen programs to empower the community, such as food skills and education initiatives covering basic cooking skills, food literacy and gardening.