Valerie Tarasuk Archives - Nova Scotia Advocate

Food banks fail to get food to majority of food-insecure families, study finds

January 2, 2020

Food banks are a wonderful institution, and in these times of austerity-induced suffering they need our full support. That said, food banks are not very efficient in getting food to hungry families. “We found that most food-insecure households delayed bill payments and sought financial help from friends and family, but only 21.1% used food banks,” the authors of a recent study state.

‘This isn’t solved by giving somebody a bag of food.’ An interview with food insecurity expert Valerie Tarasuk

May 1, 2018 1 Comment

We interview food security expert Dr. Valerie Tarasuk, who will be visiting Nova Scotia later this week. She talks about hunger counts that don’t count hunger, food banks that don’t solve food insecurity, and income thresholds that don’t reflect it. Also, why people who are food insecure get sick so much, even if the illness has nothing to do with diet. And finally, what we should do to fix the problem.