‘Did you wake up hungry? I did’

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This article was published 29/10/2023 (719 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

On the first snowy Friday of the year, Cherie Henderson is braving the cold for a warm meal.

She trudges through the slush down Furby Street to Agape Table, where a small fold-out table just outside of their doors is stacked with paper-bag breakfasts. From Monday to Friday, anyone can come by and get a healthy, albeit simple, breakfast.

“Did you wake up hungry? I did,” she tells the Free Press.

The non-profit agency recently expanded its hours to meet an influx of new visitors forced to resort to food banks to fill the gaps made by inflation stretching the paycheques of the working poor too thin.

It’s a snapshot of the ever-changing demographic of food-bank users in Manitoba and across the country. A nationwide report from Food Banks Canada released Wednesday paints a bleak picture — there has been a 32 per cent increase in food-bank use in Canada in 2023 compared to the year prior, and while unemployment levels held steady over the past year, March 2023 holds the new record for most reported food bank visits in a month at just under two million across the country.

Henderson has arrived near the end of the morning rush and grabs a coffee cup filled with soup and a paper bag with granola bars and other snacks inside.

She comes by to grab breakfast every day. She’s been on Employment and Income Assistance for “too long” and is unable to make ends meet right now. In the past, she has struggled with addiction and homelessness, and currently attends employment support programming at West Central Women’s Resource Centre in hopes of finding work. She needs steady work and more to eat, and it has become increasingly difficult to survive.

“I use food banks all the time. Food’s expensive, because of inflation,” she says.

“You should see it on a daily basis, (Agape Table) helps everybody, a lot of people, all the time. There’s always a big lineup.”

As she speaks, people pass by and pick up bagged meals, with some also grabbing family-size bags of buns and potatoes left in boxes nearby. People from all walks of life come through. Some stop to chat with volunteers while in work uniforms. Some take extra for their children.

Food Banks Canada has conducted the survey yearly since 1989, and eight food banks in Manitoba contributed to the report in 2023, documenting the number of visits in the month of March. In just one month, there were 57,351 visits (with children making up 20,794 of the visitors) and 187,737 total meals handed out — 30 per cent more than what was recorded in 2022.

At Harvest Manitoba alone, there were 48,000 visitors to its food bank in September. A report published by Harvest in 2022 found that food bank usage had skyrocketed, and 2023 has proven the issue is not going anywhere, president and CEO Vince Barletta said.

“The reality is, nothing’s changed. Last year, we were seeing record numbers of people using food banks, and that the number was going nowhere, but up,” he said.

“And here we are a year later, and once again, we’re seeing record numbers of Canadians use food banks, and the numbers are going nowhere but up.”

Today, in Manitoba, one in four people who uses a food bank has a job. As the cost of living has remained high, more and more people are slowly slipping under the poverty line.

The new NDP majority has a lot of work to do to improve food security in Manitoba, Barletta said — everything from expanding school nutrition programs to improving affordability and accessibility of transport and housing.

“There’s lots of different ways to say it, but that’s the fundamental reason why people are turning to food banks, because the rest of the cost of living doesn’t leave them with enough money for food, and that’s the only thing that’s they have any discretion over,” he said.

Back at Agape Table, volunteers pack groceries and pour the last cups of soup before the the breakfast run is set to end at 11 a.m. While the bagged breakfast is available every weekday, the non-profit also hosts a food-hamper program twice a week that helps more than 200 families.

Dave Feniuk, the general manager, calls Friday a “slow day” before laughing; more than 400 people received a meal Friday, exceeding the 250-350 who showed up on average each day before COVID-19 struck.

Upwards of 800 people in need visit most days now.

“We’ve been very fortunate that we haven’t missed a meal throughout this whole process, but it’s getting tougher,” he said.

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The vast majority of the groceries volunteers package up are donated, and Agape Table, which receives no government funding, has been able to stay afloat through the pandemic thanks to the kindness of Winnipeggers.

Feniuk hopes those who pass by the long lineups at soup kitchens this winter continue to be kind.

“The way the economy is going, with the cost of living and everything, people are a little more on edge because there’s so much month left at the end of the money right now,” he said.

“Sometimes, I’d like people just to take a step back and have a more empathetic look at the people that are on the streets and that are truly in need.”

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca

Malak Abas
Reporter

Malak Abas is a city reporter at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg’s North End, she led the campus paper at the University of Manitoba before joining the Free Press in 2020. Read more about Malak.

Every piece of reporting Malak produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.