The Honourable Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, was at Nutri Group head office, in Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec, to announce details of the first-ever federal government program that will provide millions of pounds of quality, nutritious, surplus food to Canada's most vulnerable populations.
The innovative Surplus Food Rescue Program is a $50-million federal initiative designed to address urgent, high volume, highly perishable surplus products falling under fruit, vegetables, meat and fish and seafood. These surpluses were created because the COVID-19 pandemic largely shut down the restaurant and hospitality industry, leaving many producers without a key market for their food commodities.
The program awarded contributions to eight organizations that leverage existing food redistribution and recovery networks and agencies, who will bring the food to every region in the country. Partners, which include leading not-for-profits Food Banks Canada and Second Harvest, and La Tablée des Chefs, will redistribute products such as potatoes, walleye, chicken, turkey, eggs, and more. In total, the program will redistribute approximately 12 million kilograms of surplus food to more food insecure families that would otherwise have been wasted.
Source: Newswire.