Lunenburg couple lends a helping hand amid growing food shortages

David Jarvis and Karen Beals-Jarvis spent Friday afternoon making nine hunt pies, a venison dish.

This is not for a family dinner. They will stock a community pantry located behind a small business called The Water Market on the outskirts of Lunenburg, North Carolina.

In 2022, the couple created the We Feed Lunenburg Facebook group to organize local gardeners to donate excess produce to the local Central United Church food bank. Since then, the group has grown and become more responsive to rising food insecurity.

“When people think of Lunenburg, you don’t think there could be people there who are struggling to survive,” Jarvis said. “But it’s a very rural community, everyone has to have a car. And if you have to choose between filling up your car or feeding yourself… not many people can afford that.”

They started by bringing some of the produce from their garden to the food bank. Community support grew, but so did demand.

We Feed Lunenburg opened a community pantry over the summer. It is replenished twice a week and operates separately from the food bank.

When the couple moved to Lunenburg in 2019, they began growing vegetables in a tiny greenhouse to become more self-sufficient.

However, after meeting a neighbor who was volunteering at a food bank, they began donating some of what they grew themselves.

Some time later they created a group on Facebook.

“We figured if we got 100 people into this group and 10 percent could give us tomatoes, we’d start accumulating quite a lot of fresh produce,” Jarvis said.

Soon, Jarvis, trained as a baker, began baking cookies, breads and muffins for donations.

The group now has 600 members, including local businessmen, bakers, gardeners and others who just want to get involved.

Over time, the couple noticed that demand for food was growing, especially among older people, young couples and first-timers.

According to HungerCount 2024 ReportIn 2023-24, visits to food banks in Canada increased by six per cent compared to the year before. In Nova Scotia, that figure rises to 21 percent.

High demand is putting a strain on food banks across the province, and some have been forced reduce the products they offer.

Alicia Van De Sande owns The Water Market with her partner Lee. When the Jarviss asked if they could put a pantry behind the store, she knew she had to say yes.

“We knew there was a need and this seemed like the perfect way to help,” she said.

Beals-Jarvis said the pantry was an immediate success. But she said it was “really sad, actually.”

“We’d rather it didn’t become popular because that would be a sign that it’s not necessary,” adding that she and her husband have since made We Feed Lunenburg an official charity and are thinking about expanding the pantry.