Food insecurity is a national emergency – Opinion

Instead of a wasteful gift, why not donate to food bank? Photo / 123rf
THREE KEY FACTS:
Angela Calver is chief executive of KiwiHarvest – a national food rescue organisation that collects surplus and donated food and distributes it to community organisations, providing food support to those in need. There are branches in Auckland, North Shore, Dunedin, Invercargill and Queenstown.
OPINION
I wish my job didn’t exist. Yes, you heard me. I wish there wasn’t a need for food support charities to aid the crisis in our own backyard because by some miracle every person had access to the food they needed.
But that’s not the reality we live in. Food prices, rent, mortgages, unemployment, low wages and all the other puzzle pieces are haphazardly jammed together resulting in the worst food insecurity rates I’ve seen in my life.
In fact, the United Nations’ recent report into the State of Food Security and Nutrition revealed that out of the entire world, Oceania was the only region where food insecurity actually worsened, with prevalence in New Zealand increasing from 10% (2014-2016) to 16.4% (2020-2023).
And despite what the name implies, food insecurity isn’t just about hunger. Its consequences bleed deeply throughout an individual’s life. Another study found that achievement for students in food poverty was up to four years behind their food-secure peers. Imagine what that does to a child’s future, their opportunities, and their life trajectory. And it’s happening right here in our backyard.
The funding roadblock
Food rescue organisations, like KiwiHarvest, are on the front lines of this crisis, rescuing surplus food and distributing it to communities in need. For every $100 received, food rescues can deliver at least $500 worth of food directly to frontline agencies. That’s food going straight into the hands of the people who need it most.
And we’re not just feeding people, we’re preventing perfectly edible food from going to landfills where it would’ve sat, decomposed, and released harmful greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. While the Government has made commitments to reduce these emissions as per the Paris Agreement, there’s still 10s of millions of kg of food that is going to waste annually – setting us further and further back from the 2030 goal.
But here’s the rub: we don’t have the funding to continue our growth. We know that there is good, edible surplus product out there needing to be rescued, but without funding it’s as good as wasted.
How we can deliver millions of meals?
We currently have more than 35 agencies on a waitlist, desperate for food. We want to help them, but we simply don’t have the resources. We no longer have enough funding to bring on extra drivers to cover for sick leave or holidays. If one driver is off sick for a week, it means that 6350kg of food won’t be rescued, and 14,100 meal equivalents won’t be delivered.
Without government support, 1.4 million Kiwis will miss out on meals – it’s that simple. Last year, KiwiHarvest stepped up by delivering 34% more food, equating to an additional 1.4 million meals or 650 tonnes of food, just to meet increasing demand. However, the need continues to grow, and without further funding, we won’t be able to keep up.
With $600,000, we could replicate the same growth and supply an additional 1.4 million meals in the next year. We would be turning that $600,000 into $4.1 million of food. That’s a 650% return on investment. If that doesn’t make sense financially, I don’t know what does.
Food insecurity is a national emergency. We have a proven solution that’s been effective for over a decade, and now we need to work with the Government to implement it at a national scale. We’ve run the numbers and it costs far less than they are currently paying to address the issue. It’s only a matter of them allowing us to help.
Change needs to happen, our futures depend on it.