REGINA — A unique food swap between the Regina Food Bank (RFB) and the Greater Vancouver Food Bank (GVFB) is helping both organizations combat food insecurity.
A trade between the two food banks saw over 50,000 pounds of food exchanged, with 29,000 pounds of B.C.-grown carrots, corn, parsley and kale arriving in Regina.
"We received 29,000 pounds of B.C. carrots, corn, parsley, and kale," said RFB CEO Mary Weimer.
Weimer said the produce was selected because those items are not consistently available in Regina.
"We don't always have kale. We don't always have corn, for sure. Parsley would be pretty uncommon. And these beautiful carrots with the green tops on them look just like something that would have come right off a farmer's market."
The food was quickly put to use after arriving at the food bank.
"We took the carrots in particular and combined them with a bunch of broccoli that we had received, and we created individual meals, ready-made soups that we can hand out to our clients, but we also reach out to our other agency partners, and then they can distribute to their clients," said Weimer.
According to Weimer, the shipment is valued at roughly $116,000 and will help meet the food bank's significant daily demand.
"In any given day, we are preparing and delivering hampers for about 450 clients, and each hamper or allotment is around 30 pounds. So we go through an enormous amount of food."
In return, the Greater Vancouver Food Bank will receive 22 pallets of Saskatchewan staples, including lentils, rolled oats, pasta and soup.
"We have access from our many partners in Saskatchewan to things like lentils and rolled oats, so we were able to share what we have that's a little bit extra and send it back to Vancouver," said Weimer.
This marks the second straight year the two food banks have exchanged food. Last year's swap totalled more than 90,000 pounds, while this year's exchange was smaller due to storage capacity.
Weimer said the success of the partnership has sparked conversations with other food banks about similar collaborations.
"People are super interested in how we collaborate to take one area's abundance of a particular thing and share it with someone else and do a bit of a swap," she said.
"I don't doubt we'll be able to come up with some innovative ways to continue to share what might be abundant in one place with another region that doesn't see that type of food item."
