Food bank struggles to stock shelves


RICHARD LAUTENS/TORONTO STAR
Lilly, a volunteer, arranges food at the Daily Bread Food Bank, Oct. 7, 2008. The food bank is in the middle of its fall food drive, but its shelves are still quite sparse.
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Daily Bread hopes donations increase in fall drive's final week
Oct 08, 2008 04:30 AM
Debra Black Staff Reporter

Toronto's Daily Bread Food Bank is short hundreds of thousands of pounds and dollars in its annual fall drive to fill the shelves of food banks across the GTA.
"It's extremely slow right now," said Gail Nyberg, the food bank's executive director. "We just did a count last night. We're at 110,000 pounds of food – or about 50,000 kilograms – and $98,000 in donations."
That's about 15 per cent down from the same time last year, Nyberg said. The shelves at the Daily Bread Food Bank are looking a little sparse, but Nyberg hopes the next seven days will turn things around. "This is our big week. Between today and next Monday are the biggest times of the year for us in terms of bringing in food and money. But we have a long way to go."
The food bank wants to raise 500,000 pounds of food and $500,000 in cash donations this fall. Many of its clients are what Nyberg describes as the working poor. Twenty-eight per cent of food bank users are in families where at least one person is working.
With the uncertain economic times, Nyberg is forecasting that this winter the number of working poor using the food bank will increase dramatically given the increased cost of daily expenses such as food, gas and home heating.
The shrinking job market will also play a critical role, she said. Many residents of the GTA who made $25 an hour in manufacturing jobs are now out of work and have turned to the service sector for employment. But jobs in that sector pay substantially lower at about $10 to $12 an hour. Those are the people whom Nyberg believes will increasingly turn to food banks this winter.
According to the Daily Bread's research, across the GTA there were 952,000 visits to food banks for food last year.
The fall food drive kicked off on Sept. 27 and runs until Oct. 17. Financial donations can be made online at dailybread.ca or by calling 416-203-0050. Food donations can be dropped off at any fire hall, Loblaws or Real Canadian Superstore.