An influx of Syrian refugees along with the impact of wildfires and low oil prices in Alberta drove a 1.3 per cent increase in the number of people using food banks in Canada in 2016 compared to the previous year, a new report says.

HungerCount 2016, to be released Tuesday, shows 863,492 individuals relied on a food bank in March, up from 852,137 in March, 2015, with eight out of 10 provinces experiencing a hike and Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia showing surges of more than 17 per cent.

The study by national charitable organization Food Banks Canada says unattached Canadians now account for 44 per cent of those helped by the services, even though they make up just 28 per cent of households.

Food bank use spiked in areas of the country such as Labrador City where jobs have dried up and in Edmonton, where the unemployment rate grew from 4.9 per cent in March 2014 to 6.9 per cent a year later in the wake of the plunging global price of oil.

That translated into a 31 per cent increase in food bank use in Edmonton while food bank use soared 80 per cent across Alberta, the report says.

“What set Edmonton apart are the thousands of people who flocked to the city in May to escape the wildfires further north,” it adds.

“This short-term crisis and dislocation, combined with a severe lack of affordable housing and an inadequate safety net for jobless Albertans, have pushed the city’s charitable sector to the limits.”

The report also notes the impact of the resettlement of 25,000 Syrian refugees over the past year, with nearly 1,700 landed in the Lower Mainland of B.C. and more than 40 per cent settled within Surrey.

Because they landed with few resources and could count only on welfare-level benefits to rebuild their lives, many Syrian newcomers began asking the Surrey Food Bank for help; the organization saw a 17 per cent increase in the number of people requesting assistance, with refugees playing a big part in the jump.

“The situation in Surrey raises important questions: are we expecting charities to do too much?” the report says.

It also notes that while First Nations, Métis and Inuit people accounted for 14 per cent of people receiving food from food banks nationally in March, the figure jumps to 29 per cent in small towns and rural areas — and to more than 70 per cent in northern Canada.

Conversely, the report shows a 2.9 per cent decline in food bank visits in Manitoba and a 6.4 per cent drop in Ontario, a province whose economy is forecast to grow this year at among the fastest rates of any region.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Richard Matern, senior research manager at Toronto’s Daily Bread Food Bank, said the decline in Ontario masks a shift of food bank users from the inner city to the suburbs as housing prices downtown soar even faster than those in outlying areas.

But he cited some progress in social programs aimed at reducing child poverty in the city even while needs are rising among older singles priced out of downtown neighborhoods.

Ryan Noble, executive director of the North York Harvest Food Bank, said his organization has responded to shifting needs by opening new food banks in the area over the past five years rather than simply operating as a distributor for downtown operations.

And Matern added he is encouraged by the federal government’s commitment to sit down with provincial and municipal counterparts in an effort to cobble together a nationwide poverty reduction strategy.