Peel charity putting on 5 free food markets in the GTA

While many charities across the Greater Toronto Area are struggling to meet the soaring demand for food, one organization has a unique challenge at hand how to distribute surplus vegetables to thousands of people in theregion this week.

The director of Sai Dham Food Bank says they've received four truckloads of fresh produce on top oftheir expected deliveries this weekbecause the grocery stores the produce was headedto didn't have capacity to store it.

"Instead of getting into the dump, we are trying to get it to people," Vishal Khanna said.

They plan to set upfree foodmarketsacross the GTAoffering things like lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers enough for 12 pounds of vegetables each for at least 5,000 people.

Khanna says he's hoping the vegetables will give hundreds of families sandwiches and salads.

"If people say, 'you know what, give us bread along with this,' I'll go somewhere and buy some bread," he says.

His charity, which also provides food to churches and food banks in the region, serves food to 60,000 people every month, which Khanna says is more than twice as many as last year.

Aside from setting up free farmers markets, Khanna says he was up late last night making sure pallets of vegetables reach local charities that run food programs and are struggling to meetdemand.

Food-bank use across the GTA has been rising steadily since the pandemic, with roughly one in 10 Torontonians now relying on them.

Charities have been reporting that they are being stretched thinas they try to meet record-high demand, which is a concern echoed by the administrator at Sai DhamFood Bank.

"The grocery prices are going up and people are hardly able to afford the rents. So we have seen that, as compared to last year, more people are shifting towards getting services from organizations like us," Sulabh Mahajan said.

An October 2023 report from Food Banks Canadafound that usage had reached its highest level since the survey started in 1989.

Nearly nine million Canadians lived in food insecure households in 2022, with 22.9 per cent of the population reporting some form of food insecurity, according to a Statistics Canada report released earlier this month.

Khanna says the surplus this week is a "blessing"thatwill help elevate people feeling food insecure, at least temporarily.

Mahajan says the charity never turns down requests to take food containers from suppliers, even if it means working around the clock to deliver it to people's doors when storage at the distribution centre is limited.

"We were blessed to have a full container of bell peppers last week. People went crazy, like 'Oh! Thank you so much!'" Mahajan says."They had tears in their eyes. The impact that we make keeps us motivated."

The times and locations of the free food markets are as follows (notethatclosing times dependon how long supplies last):

• 90 Acorn Pl., Mississauga: Thursday from3:30 p.m to 5:30 a.m.

• 6731 Columbus Rd., Mississauga: Friday from11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

• 101 West Dr., Unit C, Brampton: Friday from11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

• 240 Wellesley St. E., Toronto: Thursday from11 a.m to 3 p.m.

• 31 Steinway Blvd., Etobicoke: Thursday from10 a.m to 3 p.m.