Results at a Glance – Horizontal Evaluation of Nutrition North Canada 2012-2013 to 2017-2018

Office of Audit and Evaluation

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Table of contents

Introduction

 

Program Resources

 

Expected Results and Outcomes

 

What the evaluation found

 

Recommendations and Responses

It is recommended that CIRNAC:

  1. Work with communities and representatives of Indigenous peoples and governments to revise the eligible food list to be more relevant to local diets and needs.

Response:

On January 1, 2019, NNC implemented a revised food list that was developed in consultation with Northerners. The Department continues to engage on this issue and meets regularly with the NNC Indigenous Working Group, the Inuit-Crown Food Security Working Group and the NNC Advisory Board to ensure that the list is still relevant and meets the cultural and dietary needs of Northerners.

 
  1. Work with communities and representatives of Indigenous peoples and governments on strategies to further reduce the price of nutritious foods.

Response:

NNC continues to engage with the Indigenous Working Group, the Inuit-Crown Food Security Working Group and the NNC Advisory Board in order to ensure that the program is more responsive and relevant to Northerners. The program is introducing a surface transportation subsidy for sealift and winter roads as these are a better reflection of how Northerners resupply their community staples. NNC will work with the groups identified above to close the gap with respect to data quality for remote communities.

 
  1. Develop indicators for program impact that look beyond the Revised Northern Food Basket relative to the Consumer Price Index.

Response:

The Department will work to develop indicators for program impact beyond the use of a comparison between Revised Northern Food Basket and the Consumer Price Index. As an example, the program will introduce the Northern Staple Goods List, which has been developed to monitor the price of eligible items subsidized when shipped by sealift or winter road.

 
  1. Examine potential new approaches to further improve access to nutritious foods for Northerners, especially for low-income families.

Response:

The Department is examining the impact of the latest enhancements to the program to help inform the criteria that will better measure and contribute to results leading to improved access to nutritious foods for Northerners. The program enhancements to be examined include: increasing the subsidy levels in all communities; revising the NNC subsidy to remove the shipped by air restriction and, including surface transportation; increasing air-lift subsidy rates in highest needs communities; and, introducing a new Harvesters Support Grant to off-set the cost of local traditional harvesting activities to better support access to country food.

 
  1. Develop options to provide support to harvesters for supplies and tools to facilitate sharing of country food within communities, and pursue innovations for locally produced food.

Response:

NNC is implementing a harvesters support grant to help lower the high costs associated with traditional hunting and harvesting activities, and to increase efficiencies for the organizations delivering the grant.

In addition, as part of the Government of Canada’s Food Policy, Budget 2019 provided the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency with $15 million, over five years, starting in 2019–20, to establish a Northern Isolated Community Initiatives Fund. This fund will support community-led projects for local and Indigenous food production systems.

 
  1. Establish better communications with residents of eligible communities about NNC and how it works, especially the personal orders portion of the program.

Response:

The program is developing a renewed and proactive Communications approach, in collaboration with CIRNAC’s Communications Branch and Indigenous community partners, to inform residents of the latest changes to the program, and for their input on how to enhance program communications. In that vein, the program will also explore the possibility of retaining the services of a Communications Expert to develop a Strategy, and NNC will be conducting community outreach sessions to support this recommendation. NNC will also work closely with Privy Council Office’s Impact and Innovation Unit to enhance its transparency measures.

It is recommended that ISC:

 
  1. Work with communities to disseminate information to better support nutrition education about healthy eating choices including healthy alternatives to fresh fruits and vegetables.

Response:

ISC does not in all cases work directly with communities that are eligible for NNC in the delivery of NNC Nutrition Education Initiatives. Instead, ISC works with and provides funding to partners such as the territorial governments or First Nations and Inuit organizations, who in turn provide NNC Nutrition Education Initiatives to communities. Thus, to be precise, ISC will work with communities and partners at the regional and territorial levels to support nutrition education about healthy eating choices including healthy alternatives to fresh fruits and vegetables. ISC intends to initiate action to implement the recommendation immediately.

Starting in December 2019, ISC-FNIHB will:

  1. Engage with communities and partners about this recommendation through the NNC Nutrition Education Initiatives program leads, who support the nutrition education component at the regional and territorial levels.
  2. Through the program leads, engage and develop a plan with communities and partners to identify and disseminate nutrition education information. Communities and partners to be engaged throughout the planning process. Program leads will share updates on discussions with ISC-FNIHB by March 2021.

Work with communities and partners to finalize and disseminate information by December 31, 2020.

 

About this evaluation

The evaluation examined the impacts and design of components related to NNC funded by the former INAC and the nutrition education initiatives funded by Health Canada from 2012-13 to 2017-18, and included 68 key-informant interviews, including 55 interviews with community administrators and retailers as part of site visits; an extensive literature review; a document and program file review; and analysis of data.

 
 

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