Support our primary food production

• We grow over 20,000lb of vegetables each year at Tea Creek and donate the production into our Indigenous communities in our region.
• We had over 5,500 indigenous site visits in 2022 - a 350% increase over 2021. Most of those visitors benefitted from Tea Creek vegetables through meals and free veggie giveaways and distributions. 

Our concept for 2023 is for different organizations to sponsor a field block at Tea Creek. 

The cost will be $15,000 - $25,000 per field block. The blocks will be different sizes - larger 1/4 acre tractor fields, or smaller, more dense hand-farmed field blocks. 

The organization that sponsors will have right-of-first-refusal on the harvest from the block, and an opportunity to shape the plant-in, and to participate as much or as little as they want in the field over the year. Please note that ALL fields are subject to use all year from school and community groups. 

The proceeds will go towards paying dedicated farmers for the season, and will cover input costs such as fuel, seeds, water, compost, and tools. 

Please let us know if you would like to fund-a-field in 2023! We need to have all field blocks committed by end of January, 2023! Plant-in will range from March - May!

Support Indigenous Community Land-Based Education and Access

Did you know that we hosted over 1,000 additional on-site Indigenous guests in 2022? Many are kids, youth, and elders. Examples include:

• Elementary and High School class visits from Indigneous schools and classes
• Elders groups from multiple communities
• Community days where any Indigenous family can drop in

Each visitor is offered a warm meal, a chance to participate and learn from our land-based programming, and an opportunity to bring fresh healthy food home.

These visits are currently not funded or supported. We have multiple opportunities for improvement including:

• Support for supplies and materials to provide tours, meals, and food to take-home
• Funds to hire additional hosting staff, so we can host more guests, and add more community days, workshops, and special visits
• A welcome structure such as a gazebo where we can sign visitors in and out, and conduct orientations
• A "hay wagon", mutli-seat side-by-side vehicles or golf carts to provide on-site transportation options for the young, old, and physically disabled. We'd love to stop using our regular farm trailers, which are not well suited for people transport!

Help Connect Trainees to Jobs and Opportunities

The addition of a Bridging to Employment coordinator would go a long way to help trainees and apprentices transition to employment and self-employment. There are currently a lot of work opportunities in the region, and generally a shortage of workers. The jump from training to regular employment is jarring for most trainees. 

Additionally, it is important to advocate and support trainees to get into fair jobs for their training level. Consider that according to ITA BC, roughly half of Indigenous apprentices do not get hours recognized in their trade. Also consider that Indigneous people face systemic racism and discrimination in workplaces, sometimes resulting in being given jobs and tasks below their skill and training level. 

The following would help improve employment outcomes:

• Dedicated staff to assist trainees bridge to employment and self-employment
• Monies for pre-employment programming at Tea Creek
• Monies for job-ready training programs at Tea Creek
• Assist with networking to key private sector supporters

Help us build our Longhouse Food Hub!

Images for inspiration only

Tea Creek already has over 1,200 Indigenous guests per year, hosts community visits weekly in the busy season, and distributes tonnes of food per year into Indigenous families and communities. We are lacking facilities for our food hub. The Hereditary Chief of the territory we live on requested that we build a longhouse at Tea Creek. Since then we've been presenting the concept of a central Longhouse Food Hub at Tea Creek.

Provisionally, the Longhouse Food Hub would feature:

• Commercial Kitchen(s)
• Food processing facilities
• Cold storage, root cellar, and freezer
• Multi-purpose space for food distribution, education, and cultural food and medicine activities
• Composting facility nearby
• Elders parking
• Located centrally near fresh food and medicines

The cost to create the Longhouse Food Hub centre would cost $1,500,00 - $2,500,000 depending on scope and scale. 

Support Barns, Shelters, and Roof Space

Tea Creek currently lacks a functioning agricultural Barn, as well as shelters for trainees. In general, Tea Creek lacks roof space. Adding roof space around the training farm will enable: 

• Seed saving 
• More all-weather training
• Shelters for elders, youth, and people with disabilities during community visits and events
• Weather protection for tools and equipment

The cost for barn-building tends to be $30-$100/ sq ft, depending on the scope of the building or shelter.

Support Childcare for Trainees

Lack of affordable, reliable childcare is a large barrier for trainees at Tea Creek. Our site also offers a fantastic environment for children, if they have competent caregivers to keep them safe. Ideally, we would have a complimentary childcare service located on-site for participants who are unable to secure childcare at home. At a minimum on-site we would need a play area including a weather shelter (such as a gazebo).

Children on site would benefit from our land-based, culturally-safe education. They'd also have access to healthy, local food daily. 

Some Ideas:

• Support a local Indigenous entrepreneur to start a childcare business, possibly on our site, which would be actively supported by Tea Creek. 
• Support Tea Creek to add a child care space on site. 
• Provide funding for trainees and participants to hire their own in-community childcare. 

Support Indigenous Storytelling

Tea Creek provides a perfect environment for trainees to learn new storytelling skills and put them into practice. Last year we ran two pilot projects using Indigenous instructors and mentors and it went very well. In the future, we'd like storytelling training and work to be built into all our activities - part of the vision is to have Indigenous-led, Indigenous-created videos to help other nations learn from our work.

Some Ideas:

• Support purchases of New Media tools such as cameras, drones, gear, and editing computers
• Support the wages of Indigenous instructors and mentors.
• Fund a Trainee to attend an 8-week cohort including gear and meals.
• Support a Storytelling cohort.
• Support 1 year of Storytelling including weekly podcasts, photos, and video.

You can support Indigenous Youth participation at Tea Creek!

Funding for youth can be challenging for us to access. Youth respond very well to our land-based, culturally-safe training and many find careers and passions along with higher self-esteem and mental health after attending Tea Creek.

Ideally in the future we'd have full time youth programming through the year.

Some Ideas:

• Support Indigenous school visit or community day - $3,500
• Support 12 weeks of wages for a youth (15-30) to attend Tea Creek and gain work experience and training: $10,000
• Support a youth (18-30) to attend a Tea Creek 6 week training intensive including accommodation and meals: $15,000
• Support a whole Indigenous youth cohort for 8 weeks including meals: $120,000