Nutrition North’s new subsidy list fair, says advisory board member

This $29 bottle of Cheez-Whiz showed up in an Arctic Bay grocery story last February, spurring a controversy around the pricey product. In the end, Nutrition North opted to keep processed cheese spreads on its list of subsidized items. (FILE PHOTO)

Nutrition North’s finalized list of subsidized items was the result of careful consideration and public input, says a member of the program’s advisory board.

Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada released the revised list of subsidized items Nov.17, which will apply when the program is fully implemented in October, 2012.

The public helped to shape the new list, said Wilfred Wilcox, a Cambridge Bay-based member of the Nutrition North advisory board.

“Everything was given fair evaluation,” Wilcox told Nunatsiaq News. “The issues talked about in the early days are reflected in the [new] list. There are still some challenges to deal with, such as warehousing. But there’s a lot of effort that’s gone into understanding what works and what doesn’t.”

Although the list means a transition for consumers and retailers, Wilcox said its early release gives them plenty of time to prepare for the changes and plan their sealift orders.

Overall, the newly-released inventory looks similar to the original list presented by Nutrition North, with minor tweaks.

One of the most-talked about items in the early days of Nutrition North was processed cheese spread, after photos circulated of a $29 bottle of Cheez-Whiz on store shelves in Arctic Bay, Wilcox said.

“That one stayed on [the list] because it was an issue for quite a few people,” Wilcox said.

Another controversial item that will continue to get a subsidy is tofu, a soybean product widely used in Asian and vegetarian cuisine – a product that Wilcox admits most advisory board members were unfamiliar with before Nutrition North.

“But through the process, we learned more about the product and how to use it,” Wilcox said. “The territorial nutritionists [who worked on this file] have been terrific. They’ve put in a lot of work making sure the list was consistent and made sense.”

But many consumers in Nunavut and Nunavik are likely to say the new list has failed to respond to concerns voiced since the program was launched — such as the call for more subsidized access to country food.

“Country food is a really complicated issue,” Wilcox acknowledged. “In order to resolve it, people are going to have to come together. But there’s certainly a lot of interest on our board to keep working on it.”

Disposable diapers are also not up for a subsidy under Nutrition North.

“One of the things about diapers is that they don’t need to be flown,” Wilcox said, adding they don’t require special care or temperatures to be shipped by sealift. “If we’re going to be keep this a sustainable program, we have to be consistent with how we deal with items.”

But an Iqaluit retailer — who has otherwise been satisfied with Nutrition North — believes that diapers should be subsidized under the program.

Arctic Ventures’ manager Kenn Harper says disposable diapers represent a major cost to families – a cost that is not relieved much by using sealift.

“That is because [diapers] are relatively light and therefore are charged by volume on sealift, and so remain very expensive,” Harper said.

Otherwise, Harper said Arctic Ventures’ experience with Nutrition North has been positive so far.

The result has been a “better variety of product, better quality and better pricing” than under the old food mail program, Harper said.