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NWT/NUNAVUT
Leesee Papatsie is asking Northerners to talk about food security in their communities, and so far it's working.

Sister Fay Tromblay at the Tuktoyaktuk emergency food bank earlier this year. Food banks around the NWT are struggling to meet residents' needs. - NNSL file photo

Papatsie's Feeding My Family Facebook page has become part of a movement dedicated to uniting all Northerners in an attempt to change the enormous impact high food prices have on individuals and families. The page now has more than 20,000 members.

This week, more than 450 scientists, representatives from government and the private sector, and non-governmental organizations will gather in Vancouver, B.C., for the ArcticNet Annual Scientific Meeting to talk about issues facing the Arctic.

Papatsie said if she were going to the meeting, she would tell them what she's heard about what it means to be part of a family that can't afford to eat.

"Kids go to bed hungry, moms will not eat a full meal so their kids can eat," she said. "People have a hard time living from income support to another income support (payment), or from paycheque to paycheque."

She said the problem isn't just for those who can't find work. High prices mean even people with jobs have a difficult time providing for their families.

"There are a lot of working poor in Nunavut, they're the ones that may be the only person working in the household," Papatsie said. "They might have anywhere from four to eight people in the house."

Inuvik Food Bank treasurer Margaret Miller said though she is employed, she, too, has to make difficult choices at the grocery store.

"It's $30 a kilogram to buy chicken," she said. "I can't afford it and I have a good paying job. I can't afford chicken anymore."

Miller moved to Inuvik 15 years ago and said she used to be able to buy a week's worth of groceries for less than $30.

Now, she usually pays $90.

"I'm just feeding me. Can you imagine what people with families have?" she said.

Miller said each week, the food bank gives out between 50 to 75 bags of food.

Each bag costs about $33, which means the organization hands out more than $2,000 worth of food to residents every week.

Miller said the food bank raises its money by hosting TV bingo games, and sometimes hunters and fishers drop off extra meat or fish, but it only goes so far. The food bank opens for two hours once a week, on Wednesday evenings, and people can only get a bag once every two weeks.

Miller said it's not enough.

"If we don't have much money, we don't have much food," she said.

Miller said Aurora College students living in residence, single moms and elders often rely on the food bank.

Miller said she knows the problem is even worse in communities farther north.

She also said she has received calls from other communities, such as Paulatuk, asking if the food bank could share its resources.

Miller said she had to turn them down because Inuvik's rules on television bingo games state that proceeds have to stay within the community.

"They're starving up there," she said. "They asked if we can send them food."

She said many smaller communities still rely on the land as their primary source of food rather than the grocery store, but she has heard stories from residents that hunting isn't dependable anymore.

"The caribou are migrating differently," she said.

Climate change

Dr. Chris Furgal, an assistant professor at Trent University's Indigenous Environmental Studies program, is attending the ArcticNet meeting.

He said climate change is having an impact on food in the North, whether people rely on grocery stores or the land.

"There are threats and changes going on on both sides of the food equation," he said.

Furgal said for hunters, warmer temperatures make it dangerous to travel across the North's frozen lakes, rivers and sea ice to follow caribou herds and catch seals.

"We hear from many community respondents to surveys and it's having an impact on their ability to go out and safely get the food," he said.

It's also affecting the quality of the food hunters catch.

Furgal said warmer water means fish are eating different types of insects, altering the strength, fat level and taste.

"We hear reports from hunters and fishers about how the flesh of fish is changing with increased water temperatures," he said.

An increase in flies and other insects due to warmer weather can affect caribou migration and health as animals spend more energy seeking open, windy spaces to avoid aggravating insects, Furgal said.

Thawing and freezing temperatures also make snow difficult for caribou to dig to get food. Winter rain makes it even harder, but it also makes walking treacherous.

Furgal said other researchers have reported finding dead caribou with broken legs that had fallen on the ice or slipped down hills.

"The idea that Northern communities are safe from food insecurity because of the riches of resources on the land, it's really a simplified view," he said.

Unusual weather doesn't just impact those who live off the land, Furgal added.

Weather can delay planes for days and warmer temperatures and rain make ice roads unstable, which means it takes longer to resupply stores.

Stores in communities that depend on winter ice roads increase prices during the periods immediately before and after freeze-up, when supplies have to come in by plane.

Delays also mean prices stay higher longer.

Miller said she worries about communities that don't have any roads at all.

"Further north is even worse because all their stuff has to be flown in," she said.

Luckily for Inuvik, food bank volunteers and residents are working together to try to ease some of the burden in their community.

"I must say that our residents of Inuvik are very generous people," she said.

"If it wasn't for the town, we would not survive."

Papatsie said Nunavut needs more food banks. She also said wages and Nunavut Income Support payments need to be increased so people and families can afford to buy enough food.

Papatsie said for now, it's important to talking about the issue, including by posting stories to her Feeding My Family Facebook page.

"I would like to thank the people of Nunavut and Northern people for posting their hardships," she said. "It's hard to post hardships for people sometimes. They're taking that chance to do it."

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