Montreal food banks still in need of help, even after the holiday season

The end of the holiday season usually means the spirit of giving is also over, but for Montreal food banks, help is still needed.

Moisson Montréal says demand for food bank assistance has skyrocketed, with a record of nearly one million requests per month in 2024 and the numbers are expected to rise this year.

“We are looking at another year of expansion of growth, and that’s not what we want. We wish we could shrink, we wish that there were only minimal exceptional needs, but this is not the reality right now because inflation is still strong,” explained Maggie Borowiec, the director of philanthropy at Moisson Montréal.

“The cost of living is such that many people are not able to make ends meet, and there’s just, there’s still fuel being added to the fire right now.”

Borowiec says they expect to see a higher level of distribution in 2025, reminding Montrealers that food insecurity is a year long issue not just within the holiday season.

“The need is huge. The last survey that we do every year in March showed over 239,000 people in Montreal are relying on food assistance from a local community agency,” said Borowiec.

“So our 300 agencies just on the island of Montreal, not talking about all of Quebec, in March of 2024 we’re serving over 239,000 people.”

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In 2024, food banks in Montreal said more than 15 per cent of the population in the city were suffering from food insecurity, compared to 11 per cent for the rest of Quebec.

Mark St-Jean has volunteered at Moisson Montréal since last summer preparing 40-50 daily food orders for trucks that come in. He says the orders become bigger and bigger to answer a dire need and that there aren’t enough hands to help out.

“For them to have all of this ready, we have to have enough people here to be able to cope with the demand,” said St-Jean.

“There were a lot of volunteers working, but you could see that the trucks backing up, there was more and more stuff coming in, and there was almost no room to work,” he said. “There needs to be more people inside to be able to move the stuff to go back outside.”

Last month, Moisson Montréal set a record for their annual Moisson de Noël 2024 by distributing 42,000 food baskets for the holiday season. 

“From what we’re hearing from our agencies, many have even decided to stay open longer, we usually have a distribution day between Christmas and New Year’s for the exceptional agencies that are open during the holidays, typically 20 agencies come to pick up food, this year it was over 40,” said Borowiec.

Borowiec thanked Montrealers for their contributions and said information about getting involved is on their website. Volunteer spots are filled until February though people can still reach out.

“There’s no wrong way to get involved, and we hope that people will come back again this year to help us out because the need is strong and we need people.”