I was appalled to discover a few years ago that Sorrento, along with most other rural communities in the Shuswap, has a food bank. I always thought that folk in rural areas would be spared the need to ask for food charity, given that most of us live in housing that allows at least a small garden with its attendant food security. How on earth can communities which pride themselves on taking care of each other allow the need for food banks? We should be ensuring that we all have food long before the need for charity.
In the recent CSRD all-candidates meetings, there was much talk about development and the environment, but no talk about food and agriculture. There was no recognition of hunger, of loss of farms to golf courses, highways and houses, no discussion of the need to be able to feed ourselves. I would like to ask all the candidates two questions. What do you think should be done to deal with hunger in the South Shuswap? And what do you see as the position of agriculture in the Shuswap? To elaborate, what is or should be the economic and land use planning role of agriculture?
Hopefully all the candidates have already given this much thought and will have a solid platform on these issues.
Rebecca Kneen,Sorrento
