Nutrition North head gets earful from KRG

Kuujjuaq store owner Eric Pearson listens to a presentation by Nutrition North Canada in Kuujjuaq last week. Until Pearson can get a feel for the program’s new subsidies, he says the program “hasn’t really translated into anything at all.” (PHOTO BY SARAH ROGERS)

KUUJJUAQ — Nunavik leaders told Nutrition North Canada officials last week that they’ve yet to see any benefits from the new subsidy program in local stores.

Nutrition North Canada replaced the Food Mail Program April 1, 2011, with the aim of making more nutritious, perishable foods more affordable to residents of northern communities.

“We haven’t seen the change yet in the stores,” said Joseph Annahatak, vice-chair of the Kativik Regional Government’s regional council Sept. 15. “We are struggling. We still don’t understand how this will affect what we buy.”

That comment was made to Nutrition North’s director, Leo Doyle, on his first visit to Kuujjuaq to booster support for a program which continues to face heavy criticism across the region.

Doyle told the meeting of regional councillors that Nutrition North remains in a “transition period” that officials anticipate will end Oct. 2012, when a final list of subsidized items will come into effect.

“We feel, over time, that this new approached will offer significant improvement over the Food Mail program,” Doyle told councillors Sept. 15.

“We recognize that in the 14 communities in Nunavik, this entails an adjustment… because [under Food Mail] the subsidy to ship in non-perishable foods was largest here in this region.”

As the new program takes away subsidies from non-perishable items like canned foods and personal care products, Doyle said stores in the region must get into the practice of making large annual re-supplies on sealift to cut costs.

That’s exactly what Eric Pearson, the owner of Kuujjuaq store Newviq’vi, is trying to do for the first time as he finalizes his sealift order for the year.

“We’re trying to get 12 months of stock and see how that’s going to work for 2012, we want to get a feel for it,” Pearson told Nunatsiaq News. “But it’s very, very last minute.”

But until Pearson can get a feel for the annual re-supply, he says the Nutrition North subsidy “hasn’t really translated into anything at all,” adding that he’s had a difficult time negotiating a better rate with First Air.

“This was all covered under the Food Mail program with the per kilo rates,” he said.

Pearson said he’s also concerned that the program’s $60 million annual budget will be pressed by an increased consumer demand as the size of Nunavik’s young population grows.

Nunavik used about 30 per cent of the former Food Mail program’s budget.

Tommy Angnatuk, regional councillor for Quaqtaq, told the KRG council meeting that he was disappointed that snowmobile and other vehicle parts taken off the list of subsidized items.

“We know that Inuit country food is the best,” Angnatuk said. “But we go hunting with vehicles which are expensive to maintain. Skidoo parts, other vehicle parts are not included. Parts have to take two flights to arrive in our communities.”

Although Nutrition North offers a small subsidy to commercial producers of traditional foods, there are none registered in Nunavik.

“In terms of a government subsidy, the more Inuit eat country foods, the less we have to fly subsidized food into communities,” Doyle said. “The issue that needs to be studied is what the best way to do that.

As for vehicle parts, they can can be brought in very inexpensively by sealift, he said.

Nutrition North has been collecting data on its impact on prices, which will be available this fall.

“We are optimistic that slowly but surely, we’ll end up with a better program,” Doyle said. “And maybe one that documents better the challenges – [ for example] why does it cost so much more to run a store in the North?”

Nutrition North’s Advisory Committee, which includes Nunavik nutritionist Marie-Josée Gauthier, will meet next November 8 and 9 in Kuujjuaq.