Broadbent conference: How do we make food an election issue?

How can food become an election issue?

That was the question posed over the lunch hour to more than 100 delegates at the Broadbent Institute’s Progress Summit in Ottawa by representatives from Food Secure Canada – a left leaning organization that specializes in food policy. Its membership includes the National Farmers Union, the Canada FoodGrains Bank and Food Banks Canada.

Diane (sic) Bronson is the organization’s executive director who says the federal government and Canadians need to engage in a broad conversation about food: where it comes from, how it’s grown, who grows it, who eats it.

With food insecurity and the age of Canadian farmers continuing to rise, Bronson says the “overarching goal” is to secure a “national food policy for Canada.”

Conversations, she said, must be had around healthy school food programs – Food Secure Canada has asked the federal government to invest $1 billion over five years into school breakfast and lunch programs. Discussion is also needed around the “crisis” of food security in Canada’s north and the mounting challenges that are facing this country’s new farmers.

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