Initial publication: August 2024 | Updated: September 2025
Families living with food insecurity make continual trade-offs to stretch limited dollars across all their basic needs and necessities. They are often forced to prioritize competing expenses such as food, rent, utilities, medications, school costs and clothing. Every dollar matters and there’s often little to spare for extra discretionary items or savings.
In Alberta, more families than ever are experiencing this type of financial strain. Nearly 1.5 million Albertans live in food-insecure households – they simply do not have adequate income to put healthy food on the table, every meal, every day.
That’s why I Can for Kids empowers parents with grocery gift cards – a targeted income supplement that creates financial breathing room for essentials and enables families to plan, purchase and provide meals more reliably.
Families use grocery gift cards thoughtfully and strategically
In 2023, we completed a research study with the University of Calgary, investigating the experiences of grocery gift card recipients. We found that when food-insecure families have support, they make thoughtful, strategic choices.
Recipients reported using the cards to supplement their household food budgets, enabling them to better afford other essential expenses, such as rent, utilities and emergency funds. They used the grocery cards to:
- Buy more fresh fruits and vegetables and fewer pre-packaged and processed foods
- Prepare home-cooked meals more often
- Buy appropriate foods for children with food intolerances or sensitivities
- Purchase foods that align with cultural preferences
- Create special moments for the family such as birthday parties and holiday meals
- Employ money-saving strategies when food shopping – using price matching programs, selecting discounted foods, or going to lower-cost stores
Our research is consistent with a variety of studies that explore how low-income and food-insecure households make the most of limited household budgets.
In this Q&A, we’ve summarized some of the most important research that provides greater insight.
How do food-insecure households budget their money?
Years of research show that food-insecure households continually need to juggle trade-offs because they lack the finances to pay for all their basic needs. Food insecurity emerges because families are forced to prioritize competing expenses, such as housing, medication, or clothing. An analysis of the way Canadians spend their money compares the behaviours and decisions of food-secure and food-insecure populations. The results show how households living with food insecurity prioritize the essentials. They:
- spend less money overall on all types of basic expenses, including food
- must dedicate all or most of their total budget just to meet some of their basic needs
- prioritize their spending on housing, followed by food, and then transportation
- allocate less money towards leisure, clothing, insurance, investments, and items such as vehicles, sports equipment, furniture, and toys
How do food-insecure households prioritize which foods they purchase?
A systematic review of 30 studies conducted in high-income countries shows that food availability, access, and affordability exert the greatest influence on the types of groceries most of us choose to buy. However, due to financial constraints, food-insecure families always rely on price and affordability as the dominant forces behind their purchasing decisions and behaviours. A Canadian study among several hundred low-income and food-insecure families in Toronto examined the factors that had the greatest influence on the food parents chose to buy for their households. The researchers uncovered the following key themes:
- paying rent was the highest priority while food budgets continually fluctuated and remained unpredictable
- many families made minimum utility and bill payments to avoid losing services yet still reserve a bit of money to buy some food for their children
- parents reduced food costs through thrifty practices such as using coupons, taking advantage of sales, and purchasing items in bulk
- price was the overriding factor that dictated which foods a family chose to buy
- food preferences influenced purchasing behaviours because parents didn’t want to waste money on products their children might not eat
- buying the healthiest foods possible within a limited budget remained a high priority
How do income-based responses like grocery gift cards influence household choices?
There is limited evidence on the way food-insecure households choose to invest income subsidies like grocery gift cards. Although our research is the first to investigate the use of grocery gift cards in Canada, there is growing interest in the impact of this type of response. Three unique studies from Alberta, Texas, and California, show that:
- grocery gift cards help reduce financial distress because families can free up some budget to pay other major bills, particularly rent
- low-income families use grocery gift cards to improve their children’s diet quality and fruit and vegetable intake without increasing the consumption of unhealthy foods
- food-insecure college students prefer to receive grocery gift cards rather than gift cards for restaurant delivery services because grocery cards help them reduce stress, increase purchasing power, make healthier food choices, and improve their ability to study
What is the link between food insecurity and housing?
Our evaluations and research show that one of the greatest benefits of our income-based approach is ensuring vulnerable families can maintain stable housing while freeing up money for groceries. Sadly, many food-insecure populations consider regular meals a ‘nice-to-have’ option because their shelter costs remain totally inflexible and out of their control. The following results also reinforce the likelihood that food-insecure families will prioritize rent and basic needs over temptation items when they gain access to income subsidies and grocery gift cards:
- on average, a $100 increase in rent leads to a 22% increase in the risk of becoming food insecure for low-income households living in major cities across Canada
- in Canada, low-income families choose to invest federal child tax benefits on rent, food, childcare, education and transportation rather than temptation goods such as restaurants, alcohol, and tobacco
- 40% of our housed recipients face an ongoing risk of being asked to vacate their homes, particularly as rental rates continue to climb across our city
- In 2023, eviction was the second most common reason parents needed to access our program and many families had to use part of their budget to pay for moving costs
References:
- Experiences and perceived outcomes of a grocery gift card programme for households at risk of food insecurity (Public Health Nutrition: 26(11) 2023 August 2)
- The Spending Patterns of Food Insecure Households (PROOF, 2018)
- Prioritization of the essentials in the spending patterns of Canadian households experiencing food insecurity (Public Health Nutrition: 21(11) 2018 March 21)
- Exploring the influence of local food environments on food behaviours: a systematic review of qualitative literature (Public Health Nutrition: 20(13) 2017 June 7)
- Food Purchasing and Food Insecurity: Among Low-income Families in Toronto (Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research: 71(3) 2010 September)
- Effect of Brief Produce Exposure and Unconstrained Grocery Gift Cards on Caregiver Influence on Diet of Elementary Age Children (JAMA Network Open 5(5) 2022 May 27)
- Investigating the Feasibility of a Restaurant Delivery Service to Improve Food Security among College Students Experiencing Marginal Food Security, a Head-to-Head Trial with Grocery Store Gift Cards (International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (18)18 2021 September 14)
- Economic Predictors of Household Food Insecurity in Canadian Metropolitan Areas (Journal of Hunger & Environmental Nutrition 11(1) 2016)
When you donate to our program, you contribute to a powerful force for positive change that empowers food-insecure families to achieve a much healthier life balance.
To join iCAN’s expanding list of donors, sponsors, and champions, check out the different ways you can get involved or donate.
To learn more about I Can for Kids and their unique approach to childhood food insecurity, visit www.icanforkids.ca
About I Can for Kids Foundation
I Can for Kids works closely with multiple agency partners to target and distribute grocery gift cards to food-insecure families who are most in need. The iCAN grocery gift card program is a more dignified and inclusive approach to dealing with food insecurity, allowing families to shop where everyone else shops and to choose foods that are appropriate for their health and cultural needs. Explore their website to discover more about iCAN’s impact over the years.
For more information and media inquiries, please contact iCAN Executive Director, Bobbi Turko at bobbi@icanforkids.ca.
