Spark Power’s mission is aligned with the critically important mission of the Maple Leaf Centre for Action on Food Security. We are happy to provide direct financial support to the Centre through Feed Opportunity fundraising events, but Spark Power, and its key subsidiaries, New Electric and Bullfrog Power, also aim to contribute indirectly but significantly to ensuring that food security does not become an even more widespread issue moving forward.
Recently, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) released its latest report on world food security. Disturbingly, it found that for the third year in a row, the number of people around the world suffering from chronic food deprivation or undernourishment has increased. The FAO report states that climate variability and extremes are a key driver behind the recent rises in global hunger and one of the leading causes of severe food crises.
We are at a critical juncture in our ability to address this issue. Global CO2 emissions are still rising, and we are quickly burning through our remaining ‘carbon budget’ that would allow us to avoid significantly more severe climate change; at the same time, we need to produce much more food in coming years to feed a growing population with changing dietary habits. On the positive side, key technologies that can allow the decarbonization of society – solar and wind energy, stationary energy storage and electric vehicles – are reaching a tipping point. Their cost is quickly moving lower than conventional, fossil-fueled alternatives, and we need to move quickly to deploy them in the Grid of the Future.
Our mission at Spark Power is to enable the Future of Power, which is:
- Distributed – putting customers like Maple Leaf in charge of their own energy;
- Economical – allowing organizations and individuals to avoid expensive power during system peaks, and produce their own energy cheaper than buying it from the grid; and
- Sustainable – zero-carbon, and enabling the electrification of other uses of energy such as heat and transportation.
Climate change can have devastating effects on food security because of falling yields of key crops and rising prices for those who can least afford it. On the other hand, the Grid of the Future can bring more affordable energy, cleaner air and water, and help protect our food supply. As reported in the Globe and Mail recently, Canada is a global agricultural powerhouse, whose expertise can improve food security for people around the world. We are also blessed with ample resources to create sustainable energy, both physical and human.
Organizations like Maple Leaf Foods and Spark Power can lead the transformation the world requires, by making important improvements in food security and energy sustainability, right here at home.
About Feed Opportunity
The Maple Leaf Centre for Action on Food Security (“the Centre”) collaborates with other organizations and individuals to advance food security. The Centre seeks to raise the profile of this pressing social issue, advocate for critical policies and invest in programs required to make sustainable improvements.
Bringing financial and significant collaboration and in-kind support, the Centre works with innovative food-based programs that advance the capacity of people and communities to achieve sustainable food security, and have the potential to be replicated or scaled to increase their impact. The Centre supports actions that further learning, networking and measurement to assess program impact and advance knowledge sharing.