Quebec Purchases Meat for Food Banks
QUEBEC - The government has announced that Quebec plans to donate about 300,000 kg of slaughtered pork in a countrywide cull to food banks across Canada.
16 July 2008
3 minute read
The meat was slaughtered as part of a federal initiative to reduce a national pork surplus, reports CBC.
Federal subsidies for the cull cover the costs of transporting and slaughtering the pigs, but not for packaging, storing and distributing the meat.
The Quebec government agreed to pay the additional costs, estimated at $400,000, after food banks lobbied the province to put the meat to good use.
The meat is a boon to food banks, said Richard Décarie, president of the Quebec Food Bank Association.
Food banks are always looking for donations – especially animal protein – and this cull could stock organizations for a year, Décarie said.
The provincial government will pay to process, package, freeze and transport the meat to food banks.
Canada has reported a pork surplus ever since exports dropped earlier in 2008, due to rising grain prices and a strong dollar.
More than 150,000 pigs, about 10 per cent of the Canada's breeding herd, will be killed off by this fall under the federal program.
The governments of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba will cover processing costs to divert some ground pork to food banks.
In Alberta, as much as 272,000 kilograms of ground pork could end up in food banks.
View the CBC story by clicking here.
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