CANADA DOES NOT HAVE A NATIONAL POVERTY REDUCTION PROGRAM

There is something deeply wrong in British Columbia and with our government that thousands of children are hungry and school districts are forced to beg private donors for food on their behalf.

The Vancouver school district feeds breakfast and lunch to 5,000 elementary and secondary school children every day. But it says there are another 2,000 who are going hungry. It would cost $1.7 million to feed those 2,000 kids. It’s money the district doesn't have.

How many kids in other school districts are hungry and going unfed is an open question because most others haven’t done a detailed school-by-school analysis as Vancouver has. But it’s definitely not just a Vancouver problem.One in five B.C. children is growing up in poverty, according to 2012 Statistics Canada data. That’s 169,240 children.

And, while there are pockets of extreme poverty in Vancouver, the Central Coast Regional District has the highest rate with 54.8 per cent of children living in low-income families.Hungry adults can be hard to identify because they often try to hide it.

But children? They’re visible, especially to teachers.

Many are young enough not to be ashamed to say that they’re hungry and they’ve had no breakfast and there’s no food for lunch.But even if they don’t, their hunger shows up in other ways: poor marks, the inability to focus, the anger and frustration that are manifest when the body screams out for nourishment. The Vancouver school district spends $4.4 million on food programs. Of that, the $300,000 for breakfast programs already comes from by private donations either directly or through charities like The Vancouver Sun’s Adopt-a-School.

The provincial government provides $2.4 million in Community Links grants for lunch programs, while parents who can afford it provide another $1.7 million.Yet it’s clearly not enough if 2,000 kids are still without food.

Canada is one of the few developed countries without a national poverty reduction program. So, as poverty in Canada has increased, it’s charity — not taxes — that has filled the gaps.

Before 1981, there were no food banks in Canada. Since then, their use has risen exponentially. Since 2008, the number of British Columbians using food banks has increased by 25 per cent since 2008.

Of the 97,000 B.C. citizens reliant on food banks, one-third are children.

WANT TO READ MORE?: CHILDREN AND POVERTY IN CANADA

5 WAY TO END CHILD POVERTY AROUND THE WORLD

1.     With a quality education, children will get the knowledge and life skills they need to realize their full potential. Education is essential in creating change in a child’s life. Plan helps by training teachers, building new schools and breaking down barriers that prevent many children, and girls in particular, from attending school.

2.     Access to health care is essential. Plan helps communities build health clinics, train health care workers and invest in equipment and medicine so children can grow up healthy and strong.

3.     Water and sanitation are essential for every child’s survival. Every year, Plan helps communities build school latrines, community water points and helps to establish organizations to ensure the continued management and maintenance of water points.

4.     Plan works to overcome poverty by helping communities around the world gain the economic security they need to thrive. Plan is training people living in poverty to acquire the skills and knowledge they need to secure a livelihood, and support their families.

5.     Plan helps children learn their rights and take active roles within their community. Child participation helps children engage in citizenship, express their views and make decisions that will shape their future and influence the people around them.

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