{"id":4610,"date":"2020-04-14T05:02:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-14T11:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/?p=4610"},"modified":"2020-04-14T17:14:11","modified_gmt":"2020-04-14T23:14:11","slug":"alberta-pledges-2-99-per-meal-for-food-banks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/2020\/04\/14\/alberta-pledges-2-99-per-meal-for-food-banks\/","title":{"rendered":"Alberta pledges $2.99 per meal for food banks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Last week, the Government of Alberta announced $5 million<\/a> in funding to \u201csupport food banks and community organizations in their food supply efforts\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This sounds like a lot of money\u2014and I do think that $5 million is better than $0\u2014but it\u2019s important to keep it in context.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

For example, according to Food Bank Canada\u2019s HungerCount 2019 Report<\/a>, food banks distributed 1,092,416 meals and snacks in Alberta during March 2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assuming that the $5 million announced last week went to only<\/em> food banks, that would mean it would work out to about $4.58 per meal\/snack<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a second assumption: that the $5 million was a recurring monthly funding amount. If, however, it\u2019s one-time funding that food banks will be forced t0 spread out over several months\u2014given that COVID-19 is going to span several months\u2014the per-meal amount drops significantly: $2.29 per meal for 2 months, $1.53 per meal for 3 months, $1.14 per meal for 4 months, $0.92 per meal for 5 months, and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What if we look at per-person funding instead? Well, food banks in Alberta saw 89,821 visits in March 2019. This works out to about $55.67 per visit in funding<\/strong>. Again, if that money is spread out over several months, the per-visit amount drops: $27.83 per visit for 2 months, $18.56 per visit for 3 months, $13.92 per visit for 4 months, $11.13 per visit for 5 months, and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Lethbridge, for example, a monthly food hamper at the Interfaith Food Bank costs about $100<\/a>. So this funding would cover a little over half of the cost of a hamper in Lethbridge<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Calgary, on the other hand is more expensive, with their emergency food hamper for 4 people<\/a> having a market value of $316. That means that the provincial funding would cost about 17.6% of the market value of a hamper in Calgary<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Again, assuming this was a recurring funding source, not just a one-time amount. Otherwise, the next month, the food banks will be back to trying to cover 100% of the cost of the hampers on their own again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A third assumption is that the number of people using the food banks in March 2020 is the same as the number of people using them in March 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Calgary, for example, the Calgary Food Bank distributed nearly 70,000 hampers in 2018<\/a>. This month, they\u2019re reporting an increase of 100 clients a day<\/a>. At 36,500 a year, if that increase continues, that\u2019s nearly a 50% increase in clients over 2018 levels<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If we can extrapolate the same increase onto the total visits seen in Alberta in 2019, it\u2019s possible that March 2020 saw 170,411 visits to food banks throughout Alberta. That would bring the per-visit funding amount to actually $29.34<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The number of meals and snacks, if increased by the same amount, may have risen to 1,668,210, bringing the per-meal funding amount to actually $2.99<\/strong>. That\u2019s less than a Happy Meal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Again, all that assumes that the total funding is for just one month and goes to only food banks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In contrast, the federal government has pledged $100 million<\/a> to \u201cimprove access to food for Canadians facing social, economic, and health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alberta\u2019s pledge amounts to a little more than $1 per person in Alberta. Canada\u2019s pledge, in comparison, comes to about $3 per person. Canada has pledged 3 times as much per capita than Alberta has. Despite having about 7 times more people, Canada promised 20 times more food bank funding than Alberta<\/strong> has.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Had Alberta pledged a similar per capita amount as Canada, food banks in the province could be receiving $15 million instead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week, Alberta announced $5 million to \u201csupport food banks and community organizations in their food supply efforts\u201d. This sounds like a lot, but we must keep it in context.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4616,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[106],"tags":[85,101,86,100],"class_list":["post-4610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-alberta","tag-covid-19","tag-politics","tag-social-services"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/dishes-938747.png?fit=2481%2C1550&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4NkW7-1cm","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4650,"url":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/2020\/04\/16\/alberta-still-18m-short-on-wildfire-fighting-budget\/","url_meta":{"origin":4610,"position":0},"title":"Alberta still $18M short on wildfire fighting budget","author":"Kim Siever","date":"16 April 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Alberta announced that they\u2019ll spend $5 million to hire 200 firefighters this wildfire season. But they just cut their budget by $23M.","rel":"","context":"In "News"","block_context":{"text":"News","link":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/category\/news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/firefighters-702890_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/firefighters-702890_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/firefighters-702890_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/firefighters-702890_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/04\/firefighters-702890_1280.jpg?fit=1200%2C750&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4648,"url":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/2020\/04\/15\/travis-toews-lets-himself-lend-1-25b-to-oil-refinery\/","url_meta":{"origin":4610,"position":1},"title":"Travis Toews lets himself lend $1.25B to oil refinery","author":"Kim Siever","date":"15 April 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Did you know that Keystone XL isn\u2019t the only oil and gas project that the UCP government plans to spend over $1 billion on?","rel":"","context":"In "News"","block_context":{"text":"News","link":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/category\/news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/oil-pump-jack-1407715_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C927&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/oil-pump-jack-1407715_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C927&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/oil-pump-jack-1407715_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C927&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/oil-pump-jack-1407715_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C927&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/siever.ca\/kim\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/03\/oil-pump-jack-1407715_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C927&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4557,"url":"https:\/\/siever.ca\/kim\/2020\/04\/10\/alberta-lost-a-record-117000-jobs-in-march\/","url_meta":{"origin":4610,"position":2},"title":"Alberta lost a record 117,000 jobs in March","author":"Kim Siever","date":"10 April 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"The Alberta government released their March 2020 job numbers yesterday, and\u2014unsurprisingly\u2014they don\u2019t look good. 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