Food bank usage jumps in Alberta, new data shows

Food Banks Canada is sounding the alarm about a growing crisis across the country after releasing its 2025 HungerCount report.

Food bank visits in Alberta are up 134.4 per cent since 2019, according to Food Banks Canada’s 2025 HungerCount.

The report published Monday shows a growing crisis across the country, with more and more Canadians being pushed towards food insecurity.

In Alberta alone, over 210,000 people visited the food bank monthly in 2025, nearly 76,000 were children.

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The number of food bank clients in Alberta that are employed is much higher than the national average, the organization said.

“So, where the national average is about 19 per cent of folks who use food banks have employment as their primary source of income, in Alberta that’s 30 per cent,” said Kirstin Beardsley, Food Banks Canada CEO.

“It really speaks to the challenges with costs of living cause folks are not able to make ends meet, even if they do have a job they’re stopping at the food bank on the way home from work instead of the grocery store.”

Across the country, Food Bank Canada reports nearly 2.2 million monthly visits to food banks.

One-third (33 per cent) of food bank clients are children, representing nearly 712,000 monthly visits in 2025, up by over 300,000 monthly visits compared to 2019.

Nearly one-in-four households (23.1 per cent) who rely on food banks are two-parent families, compared to 18.8 per cent in 2019.

Seventy per cent of food bank clients live in market rent housing and 8.3 per cent are seniors, up from 6.8 per cent in 2019.

Calgary Food Bank

The Calgary Food Bank is seeing “record increases” in the number of individuals who are relying on it.

“We’re seeing a massive increase in working poor—folks who have full-time jobs,” said Calgary Food Bank CEO Melissa From.

In 2019, the food bank was distributing food hampers to 250 families every day.

Now, it’s up to 800 households daily.

“I think it’s beholden on all of us to consider how we can be part of the solution,” said From.

“This problem wasn’t created overnight, and it wasn’t created in isolation by any one social or political situation or any one level of government.”

Based on research conducted by the Calgary Food Bank earlier this year, 68 per cent of seniors who used the food bank had never faced food insecurity before.

“Folks who saved for retirement—planned for retirement—but absolutely did not plan for the levels of inflation that we’ve seen in the last few years,” said From.

University food banks

Demand at the University of Calgary campus food bank has increased in recent years, with more students facing food insecurity.

“In the last academic year. It was about a thousand hampers over the year, which is double what it was back 10 years ago. So, it’s increasing very much,” said Julia Law, vice-president external for the U of C Students’ Union.

“It’s a very big problem here on campus.”

A hamper provides seven days’ worth of food supplies.

At Mount Royal University, the Students’ Association has several satellite cupboards.

It’s doubled its weekly refill of those cupboards, which supply students with free groceries.

“A student facing hunger is a student that is not able to focus on their academic work, that is not able to focus on their career,” said Tala Abu Hayyaneh, president of the MRU Students’ Association representation executive council.

Students at both institutions aren’t just battling hunger but also high youth unemployment, which is at nearly 15 per cent, according to Statistics Canada.

“Students are struggling to find work, and then they don’t have an income, so they’re unable to afford a meal, so they will try to skip a meal,” Law said.

“We’ve seen the (Statistics Canada) reports … about unemployment in the country, in Alberta (and) in Calgary,” Hayyaneh said.

“It’s really alarming to see the numbers and how it’s impacting our day-to-day in terms of student supports and just kind of being able to see what students go through.”

Call to action

Food Banks Canada is calling for immediate legislative action around affordability to help curb these numbers.

“When you’ve got this number of people who are unable to make ends meet without turning to food banks and community supports, we’re depriving ourselves as a country of our ability to thrive,” said Beardsley.

Food Banks Canada is urging the federal government to modernize the employment insurance system, repair Canada’s social safety net, including enhancing the Canada Disability Benefit, improve affordability and address northern food insecurity.

Beardsley says one of the things she’s most concerned about is the food bank system itself.

“It’s ability to absorb an infinite amount of growth is just not there, we have limits on our ability to serve the number of people who come through our doors.”

She says in some cases, due to lack of donations, food banks are buying their own food to give out and have been forced to limit the number of items users can take.

Food banks are always accepting donations. For information on how to donate or volunteer, you can go online.