Cochrane Food Bank expands to serve growing northern Ont. need

Cochrane Food Bank has expanded into a new location to meet rising demand. Officials cite high costs & geographic challenges as key factors driving the increase

The Cochrane Regional Food Bank feeds people from the James Bay Coast to Hearst to Haileybury, and even Timmins.

“Feed Ontario does programs like Full Shelves where they ensure that they drop off 26 skids every so many months to us, and we allocate it to all the different food insecurity services,” said Ardis Proulx, the manager of the Cochrane Regional Foodbank and Neighbour to Neighbour Thrift Store.

On Friday, officials celebrated the opening of the new location for the Cochrane Food bank to serve residents – next door to its former location.

“It’s a real eye opener because at the same time, it identifies that there’s a huge need in our society for this, so we can’t lose sight of that,” said Cochrane Mayor Peter Politis.

The main reason for the expansion is to make way for more room for food, because the need for it is only growing and it was made possible thanks to investments from Feed Ontario and local sponsors like Agnico Eagle.

“Unfortunately, we’re seeing a growing need across Ontario, so double digit increases everywhere in the province,” said Feed Ontario’s CEO Carolyn Stewart.

“But what we see in the north is additional considerations that they don’t have to deal with everywhere else, right, so you’re dealing with geography, so greater distance between services, access issues.”

Food Banks Canada also helped pay for the expansion.

“In our most recent Hunger Count, we found that over or almost 2.2 million people are visiting food banks across the country just in the month of March (2025),” said Karen Alebon, director of national programs for Food Banks Canada.

Staff told CTV News that the Cochrane Regional Food Bank contributed to that increase.

“Cochrane had a historic high last year,” said Proulx.

“It was extremely hard. I don’t know another word to say it. Just hard to watch the amount of people that are having issues. A lot of it is housing, its jobs, they’re working multiple jobs. It’s not because people are not working – it’s the cost.”

“The affordability in this area is getting higher and higher.” - quote

“We have actually salaried employees, like most food banks do not have that, but the demand for us, it needs to be that way,” said Cochrane Food Bank Board President Martin Ayotte.

Before the expansion, the Cochrane Regional Food Bank only had the capacity to ship and receive food three days a week – now it’s up to five days a week.