The federal government plans to spend over $1 billion over five years on a national school food program that will feed an additional 400,000 school-aged children a year.
The announcement came from Prime Minister Justine Trudeau and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland at an event in Toronto April 1, and is part of the lead up to the federal budget, which will be brought down April 16.
“Children deserve to have the best start in life. But today, nearly one in four children in Canada do not get enough food. That impacts their health and their opportunities to learn and grow,” a federal press release noted.
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The funds would flow through provinces and territories, as education is a provincial jurisdiction. In the past year, British Columbia, Manitoba and Nova Scotia have allocated money toward school lunches.
During the announcement Freeland said the aim is to get started on the program “as early as the 2024-25 school year.”
Canada is currently the only G-7 country without a national school food program. The issue was a Liberal pledge in the 2021 election, and has been long-promised by the government.
The announcement is part of a recent push by the Trudeau government to position the budget as a program to restore “fairness,” especially for younger Canadian.
This past October the federal government released a “what we heard” report from consultations on a national food program. That document noted that one in five children in Canada are at risk of going to school hungry on any given day.
Lack of proper nutrition prevents proper development and learning in those students, and can have life-long effects, the report further noted.
Sylvain Charlebois, a Dalhousie University professor and food policy specialist, lauded the move on social media.
“Regardless your political affiliations, a national school food program has been long overdue in Canada,” he wrote.
—Gord Gilmour is senior editor, news and national affairs, for Glacier FarmMedia
