Neepawa Food Bank Sees Increased Need

At the beginning of the pandemic, food banks across the country - and across the world - began scrambling to stock up for the anticipated increase in need. But Amanda Naughton-Gale, director of the Neepawa Food Bank, says things didn’t quite play out that way. With the implementation of CERB, there was actually a decline in food bank usage in those early months. It wasn’t until those programs ended or changed that food bank usage settled at about 30% over what they see in the average year.

In general, food bank usage declines over the summer and then ticks up again in the fall, spiking at Christmas and then sometimes again in late spring. The difference with Christmas is the hamper program, which accommodates 50 to 60 additional families who manage to make ends meet through the rest of the year but struggle at the holidays.

Two community initiatives help out with the increased need, though donations at any time are welcome. The FCC Drive Away Hunger food drive is partnering with Neepawa Middle School this year, and the HOPE group at the high school is once again holding their Scare Away Hunger food drive after a year off. They’ve adapted the format to the pandemic, so donation bags will be distributed to households ahead of time and can be filled and left outside the front door on October 31st for contactless pickup in the early afternoon.

Naughton-Gale says a food drive will usually generate almost 3000 pounds of food, but with about 1800 pounds going out every month, it won’t sit on the shelves for long. Items always in need are products such as canned meat and peanut-free school snacks, but also personal items such as shampoo, deodorant and laundry soap which many people may not think to give.

Pre-COVID, clients would physically come to the food bank to select what they needed from their shelves, but the food bank transitioned to an online or phone system last year and clients now create a shopping list from a list of available items. This process, says Naughton-Gale, reduces the amount of food waste compared to giving out a generic hamper to clients.

One of the biggest problems, she believes, is the visibility of the food bank. A lot of people may not realise that the food bank even exists in the community year round.

“I think sometimes in a small community like Neepawa we don’t see poverty,” says Naughton-Gale. “We don’t see people homeless on the street. We understand that maybe some people struggle but we don’t kind of think that that’s a problem in our community, and it really is. Places like this are needed, and we try to deal with our clients with as much dignity and grace as we possibly can.”