Cash available to help P.E.I. schools upgrade ovens, fridges to expand food program

Money will soon be available to groups in P.E.I. to help scale up the province's school food program. 

The School Food Infrastructure Fund is a federal government initiative that provides grants to organizations across the country to help combat food insecurity. 

Non-profit and Indigenous organizations can apply for some of the $1 million available in Atlantic Canada.

The P.E.I Home and School Federation is one of the four organizations in each Atlantic province that will be handing out the grants.  

"It basically is looking to improve what schools have in their buildings already," said David Schult, the federation's president. 

"Given the fact that many schools were built before food preparation… was a consideration, a lot of the schools don't even have the infrastructure — the ovens, the fridges — to handle these things, and so this program will provide funding for those." 

Schult said the money could also go to organizations that grow or prepare food for students.

The P.E.I. government pays around $6 million annually to the non-profit that runs the school food program on the Island. Additional revenue comes from fees paid by families. 

For schools that aren't equipped to make lunches on site, external food service providers are contracted to deliver meals to nearby schools each day. At some schools, in-house chefs prepare meals for their own students and also deliver meals to nearby schools.

Officials with the P.E.I. program said demand was up 14 per cent in 2024, though the number of families contributing to the pay-what-you-can service has gone down — nearly 70 per cent made no payment last year, while 13 per cent paid the full cost of $5.75 per meal. 

WATCH | More people using P.E.I.'s school food program — but fewer families are paying for it:

More people using P.E.I.'s school food program — but fewer families are paying for it

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The P.E.I. government wants to know how it can better deliver the 'pay what you can' in-school meals to Island students. It has hired a consultant to review its $6-million school food program. CBC's Wayne Thibodeau explains.

Late last year, the federal government contributed $7.1 million over the next three years to help expand P.E.I.'s program. The funding came from Ottawa's five-year, $1-billion national school food program. 

Overall, the feds expected the funding would result in around 480,000 more meals served to kids on the Island this school year.

The school food program served almost 850,000 meals throughout the 2023-24 school year, 40 per cent more than it had the year before.

In addition to building the capacity for more schools to prepare meals in house, Schult hopes the food infrastructure funding will help pave the way to a universal breakfast program. The P.E.I. school food program only covers lunches as of now.

"I see that as the ideal, end-of-the-road hope that the school breakfast programs that each school runs independently could be put together into one program like the lunch program is run right now," he said. 

"Hopefully, this will be one step closer to that."