Christina Lee
VFR: Christina, tell us about yourself and your work with the hua foundation.
CL: Hi! My name is Christina Lee 李嘉明 (she/they), and I am a 2.5 generation Cantonese settler, born and raised on the unceded and ancestral lands and territories stewarded by hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ (Downriver Halkomelem) and Skwxwú7mesh sníchim (Squamish) speaking peoples.
I am the manager of operations + special projects at hua foundation and currently lead the Language Access Project (LAP), and co-lead our capacity building and consulting portfolios. My work at hua began with the Vancouver Chinatown Social Cohesion Report and has touched on topics including food justice, cultural heritage, equitable civic engagement, and public policy.
VFR: Please share about the hua foundation’s approach to food systems and the organization’s broad portfolio of work in this area.
CL: Our approach to food systems work focuses on ensuring we are advocating for equity, dignity, and agency for all. Our work in this sector has included workshops and informational guides to support (re)connection with cultural foods, research and advocacy towards public policy, and capacity building within and across communities to support others who are doing important work within the sector.
VFR: The award-winning Vancouver Chinatown Food Security Report documented the significant loss of food retailers in Chinatown. Can you please share some of the main findings from the report and the community impact of these losses.
The Vancouver Chinatown Food Security Report (FSR) was our attempt to put data and research behind anecdotal trends that we were seeing and hearing in the neighbourhood. Context is key: this research was conducted during the activation of the City of Vancouver’s Greenest City 2020 Action Plan. As the City celebrated reaching its target increase of 50% of food assets in 2017, three years ahead of schedule, we were seeing a very different picture in Chinatown.
Through some creative data collection, the FSR team (Angela Ho & Alan Chen) found that over a period of seven years (2009-2016), Chinatown had lost 50% of its fresh food assets. The report also raises the visibility of and clearly defines key concepts such as ‘parallel food systems’ and ‘cultural food assets’ that have continued to shape our discussion of local food systems in the region.
Up until then, most of the mainstream and public discourse around food assets was restricted to farmers markets, community gardens, and other white/western characterizations of food systems. These terms gave us language to advocate for a broader definition of food justice, especially for those who often disproportionately experience food insecurity, across multiple overlapping intersections of oppression.
This language also helps us to articulate the value that food assets have for communities, beyond nutrition. When we say that we have lost half of an area’s cultural food assets, particularly in a cultural heritage neighbourhood, we are losing more than just restaurants and grocery stores. We are losing community centres, cultural institutions, economic opportunities for language community members, and pathways to interact with and learn about local history and ways of being.
The Vancouver Chinatown FSR also shed light on the history of our local food system and how racist food, employment, land use, and immigration policies shaped the food ways of today.
VFR: To what degree are cultural food assets recognized, protected, and supported in the City of Vancouver’s policy landscape right now? Any recent developments?
CL: The pathway to policy recognition for cultural food assets has been a long and incremental journey. Following the release of the FSR, the 2017 Vancouver Food Strategy Progress Report and Action Plan Update shared new focus areas, including goals to “Improve access to healthy, affordable, culturally diverse food,” with reference to data from the FSR.
Five years later, in March 2022, a Council Motion was passed to “direct staff to explore and report back with recommendations on policy changes within City of Vancouver jurisdiction for protecting and promoting cultural food assets and other forms of intangible cultural heritage across Vancouver,” an encouraging move built in collaboration with organizers across several different ethnocultural communities.
However, in a material sense, cultural food assets continue to be lost at an alarming rate, due to ongoing regional pressures relating to real estate, cost of living, inflation, and affordability. In a region where increasing numbers of residents rely on food banks and other services to meet their basic needs, the City of Vancouver currently only dedicates 1.5 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff towards Food Security in their annual budget*.
VFR: In March 2020, the hua foundation initiated the Chinatown Cares Grocery Delivery Program in response to the pandemic. Can you please tell us about this program, the intentional way it was developed, and some of the key learnings that emerged from this process that you have outlined in the Grocery Delivery Program Resource Guide.
CL: In March 2020, due to increasing concerns around the potential for community transmission of COVID-19 and rapidly changing food access in the neighbourhood (grocery stores and restaurants closing or limited hours), the Chinatown Cares project was developed as an emergency response program to ensure access to affordable, fresh, culturally appropriate groceries for isolated Chinese-speaking seniors.
While there was a rise in mutual aid and food hampers broadly, these often lacked culturally specific options. For many of these seniors, these hampers contained food and ingredients that they were unfamiliar with and might not know how to use. We often take for granted the simplicity of a box of macaroni and cheese, but for many people within our communities, that is not their definition of ‘comfort food,’ particularly in times of crisis. The weekly deliveries also acted as a point of connection to additional wrap-around services provided by program partners, reiterating our approach to food beyond nutrition.
The pandemic and associated responses have highlighted that local governmental bodies are not adequately prepared for shocks and stresses. This is particularly true in addressing the needs of those communities who are at greatest risk, do not traditionally have access to as many resources, and often have needs that vary from those assessed and addressed by mainstream support structures, noting that these conceptions of “mainstream” are often based off a centrally assumed white, able-bodied norm.
VFR: As a researcher and thought leader on food systems in Vancouver, what are some of the big questions or issues you are currently reflecting upon?
CL: I don’t really consider myself to be a thought leader; rather, I am actively reflecting on the ways that our work as racialized settlers in this sector can uplift, support, and act in solidarity with Indigenous communities who are truly leading the way in food justice and food sovereignty.
The local food movement has a tenuous relationship with Indigenous and racialized communities; its history has excluded and erased the work of so many, for the sake of palatability. It’s our responsibility to reckon with this and hold ourselves and each other accountable in any work relating to the land and those who have stewarded it since time immemorial.
VFR: Chinatown is absolutely brimming with amazing restaurants and food stores. It might be difficult to choose, but can you please share some of your favourite places to grab a bite to eat and shop in the neighbourhood!
Congee Noodle Delight in International Village Mall, for Cantonese-style BBQ duck noodle soup is my go-to on a rainy day.
Kam Wai is great for stocking up on frozen dim sum, for when I can’t make the trip down to the neighbourhood.
Sun Fresh Bakery on Keefer Street will forever have a hold on my heart! My family originates from the Sze Yup (Four Counties) region of Southern China, and the aunties in the back speak the dialect that I always heard growing up.
VFR: Finally, how can people get involved and support the critical work of the hua foundation?
CL: Follow us on our socials @huafoundation across Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook
Check out our resources (e.g. seasonal Choi Guide, the anti-racism and solidarities resource collection) and community-based research reports (i.e. the Vancouver Chinatown Food Security Report, Vancouver Chinatown Social Cohesion report, and the Asian Community Convener Report) on our website at huafoundation.org.
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