International students in Metro Vancouver turn to food bank as prices keep climbing

Everything seems to be getting more expensive. Food, gas and housing prices are on the rise while paycheques are slow to keep pace. The CBC News series Priced Out explains why you're paying more at the register and how Canadians are coping with the high cost of everything.

When Kiranjeet Kaur moved to Canada in 2019 to go to school, she didn't expect she'd need to manage her expenses to the last dollar and still have no money to buy groceries. 

"When we come from India, we don't have work ... and we have a lot of expenses to manage, like our mobile bills, our rent and they run up our fees," Kaur, 21.

Roadblocks to putting food on her table include difficulty finding work and making sure she doesn't tap into money saved for tuition fees.

Kaur says international students spend around $1,000 a month on basics —  including housing, phone, internet, medical expenses —  while earning less than that. When she realized that she needed help with food, she discovered Guru Nanak Food Bank in Surrey and became a member.

Neeraj Walia, the director of Guru Nanak Food Bank, says he sees young people from around the world. 

"We have participants, especially international students, from everywhere, from India, from Bangladesh, from Nepal, Pakistan. We have [international students] from China, Japan, Norway" he says.

Walia says the food bank opened in 2020 with a focus on international students from South Asia, but soon learned that students from many different countries were facing the same issue of food insecurity. 

Paying tuition a priority

"They are really in the financial stress. They are only allowed to work for 20 hours [per week]. Rents are increasing as the house prices increase," Walia says.

He has heard multiple stories of international students trying to pay their tuition fee without going into more debt. He says paying tuition fees on time is more important for most of them than eating a healthy, balanced diet. 

Out of 2,200 food bank members, more than 1,500 are international students. To help international students in the Fraser Valley and B.C. Interior, Guru Nanak Food Bank has opened a second food bank in Abbotsford, and will open a third one in Kelowna this year.

A recent study from Ryerson University looking into the issue found that Kaur's experience isn't unique. 

Sutama Ghosh, associate professor in Ryerson's department of geography and environmental sciences, was one of four researchers who interviewed 30 international students. 

Many said families had taken out loans against their land — or sold land —  to pay for education, leaving students on extremely tight budgets as they try avoid causing more hardship. 

"The greatest food insecurity ideas came up when we asked them to describe 'What do you eat all day?' And upon talking to us, they realized that they have not eaten anything. They didn't talk about gaining weight. They did talk about losing weight. Feeling sick, missing classes, feeling anxious."

Subsidized cafeterias a solution

Through tuition fees and living expenses, foreign students contribute approximately $22 billion annually to Canada's economy. But Ghosh says depsite that, students are treated as "clients" and not "future Canadians."

One possible solution for this issue, Ghosh says could be subsidized cafeterias.

"We have to think of international students as not clients, but somebody who has the potential to make Canada a better place," says Ghosh.

Do rising food prices have you experiencing sticker shock at the grocery store? Show us what you've been seeing at your local supermarket and send a photo or video with a brief description to ask@cbc.ca. Be sure to also include your name and location. It may be featured on CBC News Network.