The Canadian Foodgrains Bank will again benefit from the planting of crops in the Langenburg area this year through the Grow Hope program. Grow Hope is orchestrated by Canadian Foodgrains Bank which is a Canadian based not for profit organization.
Roly and Cindy Schappert of Langenburg, together with Aberhart Farms, will assist the Grow Hope program. Schapperts supply the land while Aberhart Farms supplies the equipment and the labour on the farmland. The resulting crop will help aid in the fight against global hunger.
Rick Block, Saskatchewan representative for the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, spoke about the organization and its purpose. He said, “We’re an organization that responds to the issue of global hunger. We are in our 41st year. The program originated in 1983 and we operate as an association of member agencies. The Canadian Foodgrains Bank is an organization composed of 15 member agencies who represent a wide spectrum of Christian denominations. There are more than 30 denominations that are represented within the membership of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank”.
The mandate of the organization is to respond to hunger needs where they are most severe. The organization supplies emergency food assistance directly to countries and also looks at investing in implementing support to assist international countries with their agricultural practices.
Block mentioned how their group has helped over 80 nations throughout their 40+ year history.
Block said, “I have been with the foodgrains bank for 8 years. There’s been about 40 countries where we largely have focused our response. We’re often in about 30 to 35 countries responding to their needs. In the last 8 years, some of the countries where food assistance has been a strong focus would be places like Afghanistan, Yemen, Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan responding to Syrian refugees, DR of Congo, Ethiopia, Venezuela, Colombia, Haiti, El Salvador and Nepal”.
The organization also focuses on long term food security work where they invest in international partners to provide support to their local communities to grow their own food. The goal is to prevent families from requiring food assistance.
“We’ve been working in East Africa, in South Africa. We’ve been working in South Asia and Southeast Asia with a lot of work in Laos and Cambodia. There’s a few regions in Central and South America as well.”
The international work is done through partnership with local groups in those countries who are typically church-based partners or secular-based. The group does not partner with any government agencies internationally.
The program aims to feed countries in need but also to provide them with the working knowledge needed to continue their own ability for food growth.
In the last five years the Canadian Foodgrain Bank has been more focused on responding to emergency and immediate needs. “Our organization is now at least 70% focused on emergency immediate needs, which is a sad reflection of the amount of conflict that is happening around the world and the needs that are there.”
The organization receives aid from the federal government who help cover a portion of the donations raised from farmers and supporters contributing their time to help the battle against global hunger.
Speaking about the beginnings of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, Rick Block said, “The program was born out of the desire for prairie farmers to share their excess harvest because there was a quota system back in the 80’s. Farmers were sitting on excess grain and said to the government that it was not morally right. They were seeing good food that they grew and they did not want to let it spoil; if anything else the farmers wanted at least to see it utilized as food aid”.
The Canadian government formed a mechanism where food could be sent internationally as food aid. The network continued to grow, the partnerships have grown and Canadian farmers continue to be the backbone of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank.
Farmers organize themselves and often land that has become available is offered for its use to grow a crop as the starting point; farmers rally around that ability.
Rick explained that local businesses also find a way to contribute. “Whether they’re an ag businesses or even just local businesses that find a way to support the project. People come together to grow a crop and the proceeds of the sale of that crop then go to the Canadian Food Grains Bank.”
“Over the years, we’ve had about 35 of these projects growing. It depends on the price of grain and the yield. Annually, these growing projects together raise between $1 million and $1.5 million for the Canadian Foodgrains Bank. For 40 years, the Canadian government has matched dollars that come from donors. That really magnifies the impact that donor dollars can have. For emergency food assistance, the Canadian government has had a current and historic policy of matching up to 4 to 1 and that’s a huge match which is capped at $25 million each year. It’s a huge motivator for Canadian supporters of the foodgrains bank.”
“There’s been over 200 of these growing projects across Canada for at least the last 10 or 15 years, with around 35 in Saskatchewan, which would encompass about 3300 acres.”
Schapperts and Aberhart Farms are offering help into the Grow Hope Saskatchewan project in the Langenburg area and it is a way those in the region can become involved. Block added, “There is a significant impact internationally in terms of the money that is raised and leveraged from farmers and the government as well”.
Rick spoke about how churches are commonly part of this project and people are invited to join in the project. The sponsorship rate to assist Grow Hope is $350 an acre and donors can be part of the project.
Block reminisced about when he was able to see the benefit of the program first-hand overseas. He mentioned it is amazing “to see the change and the impact that our dollars contribute to, in terms of training around conservation, agriculture, helping to coordinate villages and savings/loans programs. To see the change at an economic level, at the household level, when families begin to be able to actually be a supplier of the market in terms of food, not having to draw on the market; families who can kind of move out of that cycle of poverty. To connect with them individually, to see what is happening on their land really is phenomenal”.
Grow Hope Saskatchewan is a project that has the ability to connect urban and rural areas in Saskatchewan. Rick Block explained, “Connecting urban and rural and in Saskatchewan is important and people would agree with that. There are many politicians that would agree with that. The project in some ways is a bit of a peace builder. The other part that’s really inspirational for me is meeting people across Saskatchewan that are involved in supporting the foodgrains bank as supporters. There’s a wide diversity of younger, older, rural, urban, politically left leaning, politically right leaning, from a wide variety of churches, and some that don’t have any church connection at all. The commonality belief at its core is that we believe that it is the right of every person to have enough food to eat”.
https://foodgrainsbank.ca/ is the website for the organization if people are seeking more information. There are many social media handles for the program such as Instagram, Facebook and X (Twitter) if you search for Canadian Food Grains Bank. There is also more local information if you search for Saskatchewan Foodgrains Bank as well as an E-newsletter you can subscribe to. Those wanting to contact Rick directly can reach him at (306) 222-8977.
www.growhopesk.ca is the website address and this as the site to go to for more info as well as to make a donation.