Tea Creek Farms plans to develop a food hub and training centre in northern B.C.'s Skeena Valley with the help of a $1 million investment from United Way B.C.'s Large Food Infrastructure Grant.
In partnership with the Government of B.C. through the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction, the aim of this food sovereignty initiative is to revitalize food production and economic interdependence. The grant will be used towards a 4,000 square-foot longhouse that will serve as the facility for the food hub and training centre.
Tea Creek is an Indigenous-led, land-based training and employment initiative located in Kitwanga. Its co-owner Jacob Beaton shared that budget for the longhouse is $2.5 million and they still need another $1 million. The rest of the gap will be covered by in-kind support in the form of them donating their time, services, materials and supplies.
The idea for this initiative and longhouse began in 2020 at a time when Beaton was being approached by local First Nations wanting him to work for them and put in a farm or garden on their lands or help revive their food production.
"Of course, I couldn't do that because I run [Tea Creek]. After the first few inquiries, I said, 'Can you send someone here? You know, someone can learn how to farm here and bring that knowledge back to their home community."
Tea Creek currently runs workshops on their farm related to farming, such as seed starting, as well as for skills like birch tapping, wild harvesting, food nutrition and more. However, their current infrastructure puts a cap on how many people they can accept each year.
"We had a school group here a few years ago and we were out in the field and it just started pouring rain, drenching us. There was nowhere to go, we had to bring out emergency blankets and hide out under trees. We currently lack indoor space, the closest thing we have is called the carport with four bays," he said.
Beaton has requests from over 70 First Nations to get help them get their food production going again. With a longhouse on Tea Creek's farm, they could potentially double their current capacity to host people for workshops, according to Beaton.
鈥淭he Longhouse hub has been a dream since our first program when elders and hereditary chiefs told us that we need to build a longhouse," he expressed. "Tea Creek is an ancestral gathering place - a place where grease trails to four different communities meet and we have over 1,000 Indigenous guests who come here every year to share, learn, and benefit from our programs."
The food hub and training centre will offer workshops on food sovereignty, preservation and economic empowerment. It will also serve as a regional hub for emergency preparedness and food coordination, with a focus on long-term sustainability through Indigenous led-development and partnerships.
"Its impacts are going to be very positive on local and regional food security," said Beaton. "We're going to have a lot more people producing food locally and processing food at a large scale locally.'"
Long-term, Beaton hopes to build the entirety of the complex that they have planned, which includes two longhouses and a large-scale food processing building.
"This investment is a testament to the importance of Indigenous-led initiatives in addressing food insecurity," said Al啪b臎ta Sabov谩, Director, Food Security, United Way B.C. "[We're] proud to support Tea Creek in their efforts to create sustainable, community-driven solutions to the unique food access challenges our northern communities face on a daily basis."
United Way B.C.'s Large Food Infrastructure Grant (LFIG) is worth $6 million and the Skeena Valley is one of six communities to receive $1 million in support of developing regional food hubs, commercial kitchens, and expanding meal production services in high-need areas.
"We all want people to have access to nutritious food, so we鈥檙e taking more action to help people withstand the impacts of the trade war and global inflation," said Sheila Malcolmson, Minister of Social Development and Poverty Reduction. "That鈥檚 why on top of hundreds of other projects, we鈥檝e funded new critical infrastructure that helps people access fresh food in Northern B.C. and throughout the province."
The project is supported by the $14 million Critical Food Infrastructure Fund (CFIF), which was announced by the Government of BC in September 2023. Spanning three years and administered by United Way B.C., the CFIF supports community food infrastructure projects by providing grants to increase capacity to offer nutritious and culturally appropriate food.
