More working families are availing themselves of food banks than ever before as Canada's economy continues to slump, according to an annual survey of the country's emergency food programs.

Food Banks Canada's Hunger Count 2008 survey, released on Tuesday, found more than 14 per cent of all food-bank users have income from employment, an increase from 11 per cent in 2002.

The survey was conducted in March, a month in which 704,414 people — 37 per cent of them children — received assistance from a food bank across the country. The number was six per cent higher than in 1997, the first year the agency began comparing data.

Overall food-bank use, however, has declined slightly so far this year over 2007, but the March survey was conducted long before the onset of the current global financial crisis.

Katharine Schmidt, Food Banks Canada’s executive director, called the survey's findings "troubling," but not surprising as further reductions of high-paying jobs in sectors such as manufacturing and forestry force more Canadians to take lower-paying, temporary or part-time employment.

"It does make sense," Schmidt told reporters during a news conference in Ottawa. "We are quickly moving from a manufacturing-based to a service-based economy. This has real consequences in the everyday lives of working families."

Families with kids are big food-bank users

Seven out of 10 provinces had an increase in the proportion of food-bank clients who were working in 2008, according to the survey's results.

Families with children make up 50 per cent of households assisted by food banks, the report says.

Schmidt said the results challenge the traditional stereotypes of those who need to use food banks.

The report also calls on the federal government to help struggling families by increasing the child tax benefit to $5,000 per child each year, while also implementing a national poverty-reduction strategy with measurable targets and timelines.

The group also wants Ottawa to increase the value of the Working Income Tax Benefit and widen eligibility to include all households with earned incomes below the most recent low income cut-off.