Harvest Manitoba getting homegrown help

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This article was published 06/05/2025 (324 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Food producers are stepping up their efforts to help Manitobans who are finding it difficult to feed themselves and their families.

Manitoba Egg Farmers announced Tuesday the group will be doubling its monthly donation to Harvest Manitoba from 1,800 dozen to 3,600 dozen, or more than 43,000 eggs.

Those eggs are coming from farmers across the province, who jumped at the chance to ramp up donations after a tour of Harvest’s facilities left organization members “awestruck,” said vice-chair Don Gaultier.

“Like egg farmers, food banks are a 24-7, 365-day type of business, because we all have to eat,” said Gaultier, an egg farmer.

“Egg farmers are proud to make a difference by sharing eggs with those in need.”

Manitoba Egg Farmers, which represents 170 regulated egg and pullet farmers in the province, has donated more than 1.2 million eggs over the last several years. The organization began regular donations to Harvest in 2020.

The increased donation comes as the need for food bank services is skyrocketing in Manitoba. At Harvest, demand has risen by 150 per cent since 2020. About 20,000 families — approximately 100,000 people — are served monthly.

“We’re seeing record demand for food banks all across the province of Manitoba,” said Harvest president Vince Barletta.

Eggs are among the most requested items, he said. Harvest, which collects nearly six million kilograms of food each year, helps more than 380 food banks and agencies in Winnipeg and across the province.

Businesses across the spectrum of food production and sales have attempted to meet the need.

At Manitoba Pork, thousands of kilograms of ground pork provided to Harvest have reached food banks across the province, including northern and First Nations communities, over the past three years.

Why specifically ground pork? The decision was intentional, in hopes of providing an accessible protein staple, along with a free recipe book with ideas on how to prepare it, said Kristen Matwychuk, Manitoba Pork’s community engagement co-ordinator.

“It’s easy to sub ground pork into any recipe people might already have — so whether it’s a spaghetti sauce recipe they have, or some meatballs, there’s lots of functionality for ground pork, and so it’s easy for people to be able to work that into their regular rotation,” she said.

The organization is in the third year of a three-year contract with Harvest Manitoba, which includes the donation of commercial-sized freezers for food banks to store the pork. By the end of this year, 18 food banks will have received the freezers and about 7,000 kilos of ground pork, a value of approximately $150,000.

“Not only do we want to provide protein, but providing the protein isn’t enough. We needed to build capacity so that they could continue to store frozen proteins, and other things as well, in their food banks in a way that’s going to serve their clients,” Matwychuk said. “That capacity-building angle was a really important thing for us, and giving back to communities.”

For smaller businesses, such as the Food Fare local grocery chain, donating has become more of a balancing act, as the cost to run a business rises.

“(Charities) call us for certain products at certain times of the year, and we’ll either provide them with that product or (say), ‘OK, here’s what this product costs, 50-50, you pay half, we’ll pay half or donate half.’ It varies every single year, and it’s based on what the overall ask is from everybody,” Food Fare co-owner Munther Zeid said.

“We try not to say no to the organizations we’re involved in.”

They’ve had the yellow plastic donation bins for shoppers to drop off food items to donate to Harvest in their stores for many years, but Zeid said those donations have slowed, even during the holiday season, where in previous years, he would have to call Harvest to pick up overflowing bins every few days.

Even a long-held charity initiative in which shoppers could donate $1 and put their name up on the shop’s wall has dried up — Zeid said the number of people who agree to donate a dollar has gone down by 50 per cent.

“Some people just go, ‘It’s too much, I can’t afford it, I need this dollar right now,’” Zeid said.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca