Food security in Canada in times of COVID-19: a paradigm shift
The Margaret A. Gilliam Lecture Series in Global Food Security presents Dr Gisèle Yasmeen, Executive Director – Food Secure Canada. Join us online via ZOOM
COVID-19 has drawn attention to the precariousness and interdependence of our food system. Canadians, and others around the world, are experiencing challenges feeding themselves. People are being forced to choose between paying their rent or putting food on the table. This includes groups that already have difficulty doing so, due to poverty or mobility issues. This crisis demands that we ask serious questions about the structural inequalities in our food system. While providing urgent support is essential, COVID-19 could provide an opening for something much greater. Now is the time to respond by strengthening local, regional and domestic food supply chains and building more robust social protection to ensure people can access the basics. The current industrial food system is also in need of transformation. How will our response to COVID-19 address the climate crisis as well as diet-related disease and promote sustainable livelihoods? This presentation will delve into how food policies and associated programming such as institutional procurement – including school food – which could provide the kind of levers to transition Canada toward a healthier, more just and sustainable food system.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER:
Dr Yasmeen joined Food Secure Canada as Executive Director in May 2019 and has 20 years of leadership experience in knowledge organizations having served as a not-for-profit and government executive including Vice-President of Research and Partnerships at the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Senior Director of Outreach, Communications and Research at Elections Canada and founding Regional Director for British Columbia and the Yukon of the Centre for Research and Information on Canada. Gisèle brings a deep food systems lens to her work and started working on agri-food issues in both Asia and Canada in the early 1990s and has published widely in the field including two books, several scholarly articles and media commentary in both English and French. She has held faculty appointments at the University of British Columbia, Royal Roads University and Dawson College in Montreal. Gisèle has a PhD from the University of British Columbia, a master’s degree from McGill and a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) from University of Ottawa. Gisèle has also advised numerous organizations including the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, “The Big Picnic” (a European-Union funded project on food security involving botanical gardens), the World Bank, the United Nations FAO and the Laurier Centre for Sustainable Food Systems. Gisèle is currently a member of the scientific committee of CityFood project at New York University. She has also served on four boards of directors of Canadian not-for-profit organizations over the course of her career.