Updated March 30, 2026
We all learned it from health class and Sesame Street – nutritious food is an indispensable part of good health. But we are not meeting the need. In 2025, the Daily Bread Food and North York Harvest Food Banks reported that in Toronto, one in 10 people rely on food banks, and one in four households are food insecure. The problem exists nationwide. In Canada, 18 per cent of families reported experiencing food insecurity in 2022. There are many causes of food insecurity, including poverty driven by increased housing costs, inflation and insufficient wages and income supports.
That’s why it’s good news that Toronto City Council recently voted to move forward on a pilot project to open City-run grocery stores in four neighbourhoods in need. If our current grocers aren’t supplying affordable, healthy options, government should step in.
It’s also good that the federal government has enacted the Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit, which they hope will reach over 12 million Canadians. This benefit recognizes that, as advocates have argued for years, food insecurity is caused by a lack of income security. If you have somewhere to live, but your housing and utility costs are too high, food is somewhere you can – and where people do – cut back.
Wellesley Institute has previously proposed a third approach – reduce prices of healthy food for all by working across our supply chain to ensure every grocery store is able to offer the items in Canada’s Nutritious Food Basket at a price everyone can afford. We may not need to regulate the price of imported chocolate, but a national project to ensure apples, whole wheat flour and eggs, for example, are affordable for everyone would benefit the entire food industry and all Canadians.
The food insecurity crisis is so important that all these approaches deserve serious government effort, as will other new ideas – but none of them are perfect.
City-run grocery stores may run into challenges accessing our food supply chains in the face of grocery sector consolidation. Existing players may have contractual arrangements making it difficult to locate, stock and make the food that people need affordable. The new federal benefit provides short-term assistance in the face of inflation but does not address structural issues such as supply chain vulnerabilities, competition problems, low wages, and inadequate social security programs like the Ontario Disability Support Program and Ontario Works. It could also lead to price increases without further interventions, as markets take advantage of the increased income. Wellesley Institute’s goal of controlling prices for specific healthy foods requires our entire food supply chain to be adjusted and strengthened to ensure supply. It would also not address challenges of food deserts (neighbourhoods where grocery stores do not exist) or food swamps (communities where unhealthy options are the only options).
But we cannot let these challenges stand in the way of the progress we need to achieve the goal of healthy, affordable food for everyone in Canada. These are dangerous, challenging times, but times like these are exactly when we need bold action to improve health, our economy and our communities.
Food insecurity needs all hands on deck. We encourage Toronto to put its best foot forward on public grocery stores, and other levels of government, to solve supply chain challenges. We hope the federal government will continue to improve income supports and turn its attention to provinces who are not doing their part to ensure that everyone has the income they need to thrive, to live healthy, engaged lives. We continue to urge government to step in to ensure we can all buy the necessities in Canada’s Nutritious Food Basket at a price everyone can afford. We trust caring individuals and organizations across Canada worried about food insecurity will continue to press forward with new ideas that, together, can solve this problem for good.
Because we will all benefit when food insecurity is history.