The hustle and bustle of the Life Building is not unknown to UBC students. It’s always busy — lines to buy food wrap around the building and each cold blue and white chair is filled with students. But the basement of the Life Building is different.
It’s quieter. It’s more welcoming.
In the basement, behind a warm brown mural, chalk menus, many well-loved and brightly-coloured chairs and the aroma of shepherd’s pie, you have Sprouts — a volunteer-run food co-op that serves affordable vegan meals to students. Students fill the space recounting the events of last weekend over coffee and brownies. Sprouts volunteers spend their time cooking daily specials for students. Behind all of this is fifth-year computer science student and Sprouts president, Jac Gunn.
It’s a normal day for Gunn. They ran out earlier to pick up a loaf of bread because the cafe was going to run out and spent the rest of the day making sure Sprouts ran smoothly. It’s also a normal day for the many students buzzing in and out of the cafe, who rely on Sprouts for hot and affordable meals on campus.
“Food should be free,” said Gunn. “Everyone should have access to healthy, free food all the time.”
According to the UBC Food Security Initiative (FSI), food insecurity is the “inadequate or insecure access to food due to financial constraints.” According to the 2020 AMS Academic Experience Survey, 42 per cent of undergraduate and 44 per cent of graduate students at UBC have had “concerns about running out of food.”
This is roughly three times the 2020 national average..
Graduate students in particular are disproportionately impacted by food insecurity compared to undergraduate students. In 2018, approximately one in ten graduate students at UBC said financial pressures may cause them to leave their studies.
AMS VP Academic and University Affairs (AUA) Eshana Bhangu attributed this discrepancy to financial support.
“It can be even harder [for PhD students] than it is for an undergraduate student because they don’t have the luxury of parental support sometimes.”
The minimum funding for PhD students at UBC is $22,000, which equates to an hourly wage of $11.22.
This is $3.98 under the 2020 provincial minimum wage.
“These are the students who are doing work for the university and make UBC [one of] the top 35 universities. I would say that [the university] needs to be supporting these students better by increasing minimum funding,”said Bhangu.
Before the pandemic, 37 per cent of undergraduate students identified as food insecure, according to the the 2019 UBC Undergraduate Experience Survey (UES). The UES was not conducted in 2020.
According to a 2021 report by Oxford Economics, Vancouver is the least affordable city in North America.
The Housing Affordability Index measures the ratio of housing-related costs like monthly mortgage payments, rent, utilities and moving costs to a household's disposable income. For a city to be considered affordable, it can score a maximum of 1.1.
Vancouver has a score of 1.67.
With the pandemic impacting supply chains, rising housing costs in Vancouver and UBC and increasing tuition, some students can’t afford to purchase food.
“When we have conversations about how can we create a more food-secure campus, you can’t have them without talking about how can we create a more affordable campus or how can we create a more affordable housing landscape on campus,” said Mitchell Prost, the AMS student services manager.
The recent tuition increase put an additional $5.5 million into the already existing $14.1 million bursary fund for students facing financial challenges. $45,000 was allocated to combat food insecurity on campus.
“It’s not just that a student is food insecure, but a student is struggling financially because of high tuition or rent,” said Bhangu.
Bhangu is part of the Student Affordability Task Force. She said the group is trying to create an affordability plan targeted toward groups that are disproportionality affected by food insecurity and other affordability issues.
Food banks are fighting for you
In the summer of 1986, the AMS hired its very first food bank coordinator, Sandra Jarvis, for a food bank that didn’t exist yet.
Jarvis didn’t have a team or any donations. All she had was a location — the Lutheran Campus Centre.
The AMS never planned to run a food bank in the long run. It “simply initiated the project to fill a need on campus,” according to September 1986 Ubyssey article. Students were navigating food insecurity through the Vancouver Food Bank and various food drives organized by student associations, but there was no food bank for students.
The AMS Food Bank was well established ten years later in 1996 as an emergency food relief service for students. The Food Bank is still running today, with lines often stretching from the Life Building into the Nest.
Before the pandemic, students could only access the food bank’s services six times a semester. Now, students can access the food bank up to 16 times per semester. This change was made to accommodate students who were facing new financial difficulties due to the pandemic. It has also put the AMS Food Bank continually at capacity.
“Every [visitor] that comes in does end up taking food. [But] we try not to turn anyone away because of lack of resources,” said Prost.
Operating on a ‘trust-based system,’ the AMS Food Bank won’t turn away any UBC student. This means that students do not need to verify that they are food insecure, they just need a valid UBC student number to access services.
The food bank was accessed 960 times by students in 2018/19, 1,513 times during 2019/20 and 2,373 times in 2020/21.
That's roughly a 64 per cent increase in food bank visits from 2019/20 to 2020/21.
The AMS Food Bank is supported by funds from the AMS, sponsor funding, a stipend from the UBC President’s Office and donations from community members.
Beyond having the physical food bank space, the Food Bank also works with community organizations to combat food insecurity. It's also worked with the UBC Botanical Garden in distributing fresh produce to food bank clientele and with the BC Ministry of Health on Farmer’s Market Nutrition Coupon Program, where food-insecure households can access fresh produce, dairy and meat products.
Currently, the Food Bank is working with Sprouts to offer free meals for students.
Outside of it's normal day-to-day functions, the AMS Food Bank’s leadership team advocates for increased awareness of food insecurity through the Office of the AMS VP AUA.
“We have continued to advocate to make the issue of food insecurity more known throughout campus and that has resulted in receiving donations which have helped keep the food bank stocked,” said Friedman.
During the pandemic, the Food Bank operated using a hamper system, where students would receive a package of food and necessities. Shifting back to its grocery model, students are now allowed to enter the physical food bank space again. However, due to stock, limits on how much students can take are posted around the food bank to ensure equal access to supplies, said Friedman.
According to a 2018 SEEDS Sustainability Program report, 70 per cent of AMS Food Bank users faced moderate or severe food insecurity. Twenty-eight per cent of these students were accessing the AMS Food Bank in emergency situations only, highlighting a need for non-emergency relief at UBC.
“The AMS Food Bank is a service created by students, here for students and run by students,” said Prost. “No matter what the university does or does not do, the AMS Food Bank is a service that will stay.”
Through the FSI, UBC Wellbeing allocated $65,000 to the AMS Food Bank in October 2021. These funds were secured by UBC through the tuition increases this past year.
“While in the future we hope that food security will be good enough that an emergency resource won’t be necessary, we’re committed to fill that gap if it exists,” said Prost.
Taking matters into their own hands
A common thread in the fight against food insecurity at UBC is that it's led by students.
Sprouts’ main initiatives include running its cafe and hosting Community Eats, a by-donation lunch, most Fridays. Sprouts has been closed for much of the pandemic. Currently, the cafe and Community Eats are not running. Instead, Sprouts is hosting a by-donation produce market on Mondays.
“Getting started again and getting the space back open was definitely a challenge after being closed for a whole year,” said Gunn. They elaborated that this was because of the turnover in its board and volunteer base.
“Food is just more and more expensive,” said Gunn.
By relying on volunteers, selling food at cost and using funds from the FSI, Sprouts is able to run and keep prices low.
“For a long time, a big focus of Sprouts was [to provide] sustainable vegan foods that students can enjoy. But we have put a greater emphasis on affordability and making our food available for people, which is a direction that the current Sprouts board is really interested in moving towards,” said Gunn.
Besides Sprouts, other sustainable and affordable food outlets on campus include Fooood and Agora Cafe. Currently, Agora — another student-run organization — is closed due to the pandemic but was on track to open at the start of this start of this semester. Fooood is run by UBC Food Services and is now open.
The recent tuition increases have allocated $45,000 of tuition revenue to projects administered by the FSI to support groups that promote food security like Sprouts, Agora Cafe, Fooood and the Acadia Food Hub. UBC said it will allocate the extra money from tuition increases to student-facing priorities by March 2022.
“I think that the university has a big responsibility [to bridge the gap in food insecurity], especially with providing more support for students. I think they’re starting to do that with the FSI, but there’s always more that could be done,” said Gunn.
UBC knows
During a November 20, 2020 Board of Governors meeting, the FSI, formerly known as the Food Insecurity Action Team (FIAT), called on UBC to establish conditions for tuition increases, raise funding for masters and PhD students on both the Vancouver and Okanagan campuses and for funding for a Community Food Hub on the Okanagan campus.
“I love changing systems. I hate injustice and I want to change the world,” said Sara Kozicky, the current food security project manager for UBC Wellbeing. “I want to change this community to be more equitable, and for all students to have access and the ability to have the university experience that's shown on a university brochure.”
To Kozicky, students going hungry is an injustice because it can impact their health and wellbeing, as well as their academics.
Students who are low-income, international, transgender or non-binary, disabled or BIPOC are at a higher risk to experience food insecurity, according to a survey conducted by the Board of Governors. According to the FSI, food insecurity is tied to income.
“I don't think that is fair at all,” said Kozicky.
Building a campus culture that is aware of food insecurity while taking a nuanced approach to combating it is important to Kozicky. She said she wants the campus culture to highlight food injustice, access to culturally appropriate food and sustainability in its commitment to combatting food insecurity.
“A lot of our work is advocacy,” said Kozicky.
The FSI team is made up of students, staff and faculty collaboratively working together. In the words of Kozicky, it’s “quite an open table.”
The FSI focuses on finding long-term solutions to food insecurity in the student population. Currently, the FSI is focusing on short-term relief through providing aid to the UBC Food Hub, AMS Food Bank, Fooood and emergency food programs like the Acadia Food Hub.
Moving to empowering community programs like Sprouts, Agora Cafe, UBC Farm and Botanical Garden, as well as starting the Community Food Security Hub is what the FSI would like to do next.
Kozicky’s vision for the Community Food Security Hub is that the space would have community kitchen facilities, space to grow food and a market to access low-cost or at-cost food.
The FSI started the UBC Meal Share program which began its pilot phase October 2021 and will end April 2022. The program allows students who self-identify as food insecure on both the UBC Vancouver and Okanagan campuses to receive $100 of funds to their UBCcard or a $100 Loblaws e-gift card.
Students are able to apply to access funds twice a term, meaning that students can access a total of $200 per term. The funds are made available to students at the start of each month after their application. With the program being confidential, only UBC Meal Share administrators will know who accessed the services.
Kozicky and Bhangu both said that the program gives students who are food insecure “dignity” in seeking out help.
“[Applying] isn't asking students to write a really long story about why they deserve these funds and why they're experiencing food insecurity,” said Kozicky. “It is meant to be more dignified. We're really trying to transition some of these more emergency supports to be more dignified.”
In May 2021, Bhangu's advocacy secured $480,000 for the UBC Meal Share program.
“[The UBC Meal Share Program] is one of my favourite programs at UBC when it comes to tackling food insecurity just because of how dignified it is,” said Bhangu.
In anticipation for next year, Bhangu has advocated for $200,000 for the UBC Meal Share program, as well as an additional $550,000 to $750,000 to be put toward other programs that address food insecurity.
“There are students on our campus who will wake up, have a cup of coffee to feel full, then wait a few hours and drink another cup of coffee because it’s too expensive for them to buy food,” said Bhangu. “The fact that [these students] could be the classmates sitting right beside me is something that I always have in mind.”
Bhangu believes that focusing on transitioning from an emergency food support model to a community-led sustainable model is integral to ensure student food security. Bhangu has advocated for an in-person community food hub.
Currently, the only on-campus food hub is run by Dr. Jennifer Katz in the Acadia Park commonsblock. Acadia Park is a residence for students with dependents and families, many of which are postgraduate students.
“We can’t ignore the thing right before us — that there’s obviously someone here that’s failing in their responsibility to ensure all students are provided for and I would say that the university needs to do more,” said Bhangu.
In a 2019 report to the Board of Governors, FIAT recognized that students face an increased risk of becoming food insecure because of tuition fees, textbook costs, housing costs and inadequate financial assistance.
The key actions underway, that were identified or supported by FIAT, include Fooood, the Student Wellbeing Fund, open education resources and the Emergency Food Card Program by Enrolment Services, which provides students in “immediate need with Save-on-[Foods] gift cards when the AMS Food Bank is closed.”
“Tackling that long term issue of affordability is very important. Emergency-based models are great and they’re very necessary right now, but that can’t be the end goal. The end goal has to be to reduce food insecurity to a level where it’s essentially zero on campus,” said Bhangu.
While Bhangu believes that focusing on creating long-term support for food insecurity is integral to ensuring that students do not go hungry, Prost believes the opposite.
“Whether or not [UBC] is doing enough [to address food insecurity] is a tough question to answer. I think with food insecurity, there’s always more that can be done and what I’m seeing now is more being done to plan for the long-term,” said Prost. “For the short-term there is a distinct lack of support and we see that in how many people come to the AMS Food Bank and Acadia Food Hub.”
Ensuring that UBC takes strides to create long-term goals to eradicate food insecurity on campus was a sentiment raised by Bhangu and endorsed by Kozicky in their respective interviews with The Ubyssey.
Currently, Kozicky’s long-term hopes lie in creating and sustaining the Community Food Security Hub. This would be a student-run and research-focused space that “prioritizes the campus community needs while integrating holistic support services, programming, and facilities required to address the high prevalence of food insecurity.” Kozicky highlighted that the FSI strives to pay students for their work.
The Community Food Security Hub would be UBC’s first student-run food hub. The project, which is aiming to hire students who have been impacted by food insecurity, has been developing a pilot program since February 2021 and will continue to do so until January 2022.
Prost believes that there needs to be a more interconnected food security landscape on campus. “I think what the community needs is for that work to be done now and to be done faster. It’s great to do lots of planning but what we need is action. Which I am hopeful will arrive, it just takes time.”
In regards to what UBC can do to improve food security on campus, Kozicy emphasized the importance of the affordability task force and the Wellbeing Strategic Framework and other detailed plans to combat the issue.
“There’s plenty of advocacy that every individual can take part in,” said Kozicky. She wants to see an understanding of the financial barriers, like tuition and rent, that lead to food insecurity by the broader UBC community.
“We are fighting to reduce food insecurity on campus,” said Bhangu, “and hopefully we’ll get there one day.”
‘Food should be free’
The basement of the Life Building is where Gunn spends most of their time, not just because it’s quieter or more welcoming than the other floors, but because of Sprouts. Behind coloured chairs and chalk menu boards, there’s a community of students, who like Gunn, believe that food should be free and everyone should be able to access it. And they're willing to work towards that.
It was a normal day for Gunn and the Sprouts team in their basement location, feeding UBC students. It was also a normal day for the students on the main floor of the Life Building, standing in a line surrounded by the hustle and bustle of student life, hoping their credit card doesn’t decline.
The article was originally published in the February 1, 2022 issue of The Ubyssey.