Reflections
on 2021
A Message from the Chair
One of the first things people learn, when they join our Board at Food First NL, is that our work connects to just about everything. As we step back and look at the organization’s work in 2021, that becomes abundantly clear.
This year, Food First NL played a vital role in responding to the ongoing pandemic, in community economic development, in policy development, in community-led research, and in building food systems and community action across the province and the country. It’s a tall order for a team of just over a dozen staff, and the Board of Directors continues be very proud of their work at every level.
The huge range of work Food First NL does (and can do) is a rare opportunity to shift big, complex systems. It’s also a challenge - we can’t, and shouldn’t try, to do everything. With that in mind, the Board is excited to be heading into a year of work to renew the Strategic Framework that has been guiding Food First NL forward. In the years since that framework was adopted, the world has changed, our partners have changed, and our team has changed. This will be a critical opportunity for us to check in with our community and focus our efforts for the years to come, and we look forward to hearing from many of you as that moves forward.
Those years really are full of opportunities to make big shifts in this province’s food security. There are big changes coming in policy, a growing landscape of social innovators and social enterprises, and a sense of urgency that is stronger than ever.
Those changes won’t happen overnight or through Food First NL’s work alone. As always, we will depend on the hundreds of organizations and thousands of people who are working to create stronger food systems all over the province. Since our founding more than 20 years ago, we have always served as a vital connection between these people and these projects, and in 2021 the Board expects to see that more strongly than ever.
Carolann Harding
Chair, Board of Directors
Message from Our CEO
Early in 2021, after a day-long parade of Zoom calls, I caught myself daydreaming about being stuck in a windowless conference room, with bad coffee, and stale sandwiches, solving the world’s problems. Guess what: it happened! This year was marked by many similar moments of normalcy for me and for our team, and yet it was anything but a normal year.
In 2021, we understood that we were in it for the long haul. A pandemic response program that started in 2020 with a spreadsheet of food programs had grown into a full-on support service with a budget in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and a vision of doing things differently.
The lives of the people on the team and the people we worked with continued to be shaken up in unexpected ways. Amidst all this, projects tucked away during the early days of the pandemic started to come back out for a bit of fresh air. This year was a lot - and I’m so proud of what our team achieved. I’m also proud that we were able to recognize where we were pushing our limits and either pull back or add capacity on the team. We (I) are working on saying “no” to things!
As you’ll see reading this report, alongside our ongoing pandemic response, 2021 was a year of coalition-building, social innovation, and support for partners all over the province. In the public policy space, we saw more and more traction build for some of the big ideas - from a basic income to social procurement - that could transform the food security landscape. Both decision-makers and the general public have a much more realistic and nuanced understanding of food security than in the past, and we are proud to be playing a role in that continuing conversation.
All this impact really was a team effort, and 2021 was full of opportunities for our staff to step into leadership roles all over the food system. I was so proud to see all that they accomplished. As we head into a year that is sure to be marked by both further growth and reflection about where that growth should take us, these people are an incredible asset to this province and I’m so happy to work with them.
Josh Smee
CEO