Multiculturalism is central to Canada's national identity. It is how Canadians like to distinguish themselves on the international stage. But this mythology obscures the realities of Black, Indigenous and people of color otherwise known as BIPOC who experienced ongoing colonialism and racism. These forces have led to fast social inequities, including the prevalence of food insecurity in one in every two first nations households, and nearly one in every three black households compared to one in 10 white Canadian households. In addition, migrant workers who produce food for Canadians, but who are not recognized as citizens or rights holders are among the groups that are most vulnerable to food insecurity and other social consequences of the pandemic. In today's episode, we examine patterns of dietary inequity and struggles for food justice that challenge Canada's multicultural facade. Welcome to Rights not Charity. This podcast series is about a big idea, ensuring everyone has enough food not as a charitable gift, but as a fundamental human right. My name is Audrey Tung, and I'm a PhD student at the University of Victoria. Our guest today's Jade Guthrie. She's an expert on issues of food justice and food sovereignty in both theory and practice. She's a community food programs lead at FoodShare Toronto and a community organizer with Justice for Migrant Workers. Drawing from her background in social work, Jade applies an intersectional and anti-oppressive approach to advocacy for the right to food. Interview Summary So Jade in your most recent article in the Right to Food and Nutrition Watch report, you highlighted the distinction between structural and superficial responses to hunger. And you also demonstrated that the pandemic has exacerbated longstanding and long overlooked social inequities in Canada. Can you tell us a bit about why black and indigenous communities are disproportionately vulnerable to food insecurity? So I think first off, it's really important to recognize that Canada's food system as a whole is very much built on foundation of systems and structures of oppression. So things like settler colonialism and capitalism, systemic racism and structural poverty. So, it's no mistake then that certain communities, mainly BIPOC communities are bearing the brunt of the violence of our food system. I think we often hear kind of mainstream narratives that reinforce this idea that our system is failing or it's broken. But the fact of the matter is that it's not failing or broken, it's working exactly how it was built to. It was built on the backs of these folks. Canada's economic and social structures are low road, capitalists, colonial ones. So, our entire system as a country began on the backs of enslaved people, enslaved BIPOC folks. And today those systems continue to disproportionally impact these communities really violently. And then we see this play out in people's lives in terms of levels to access to food. Like you mentioned, black families are more than three and a half times more likely to experience food insecurity than white families here in Canada. So we see it playing out in the number of systemic barriers people face in trying to access the food they need to thrive. We might ask questions like why is it so hard to find affordable fresh produce in mainly black and indigenous and lower income neighborhoods? And it's not a coincidence, but it's a result of planning and policy processes that systematically under-resource certain communities. We also see this disproportionate impact playing out in terms of policing and food. So, why do certain grocery stores have police officers or security guards or metal detectors while others don't? Or why is baby food locked up in certain neighborhoods? So the question comes up of how many young, black and indigenous folks first encounter with the carceral system comes out of inequitable access to food. There's a lot of connections to be made here between policing and food insecurity that I think are really important to think about. And then, also it is super important to recognize and think about the ways in which our state's policies have historically and continue to attempt to destroy indigenous food ways and practices and traditions. So, if you could look back in time to something like the banning of potlatch ceremony and the Indian Act, or today you could look to the struggle for traditional fishing rights on the East Coast for the Mi'kmaq fisher folk. So when we look at the ways that our state's policies have enacted and continue to enact so much violence on these communities, it's no surprise that the relationships that indigenous and black folks have with food are often fraught and quite violent. I think lastly, it's also really important to recognize how these broader systems of oppression intersect to, for example, folks who work in frontline positions, which are often underpaid and quite exploded of in nature are disproportionally BIPOC ...
