Growing sustainable food: Canada’s chance to lead

The agriculture and agri-food sectors are, perhaps, the most complex, diverse and challenging sectors to work with on sustainability. There are several efforts underway in Canada, some national and some regional, some focused on smaller-scale farms and some with large industrial agri-food interests, but there is not a cohesive sense of the endgame.  What does sustainable, climate-resilient, profitable farming, at scale, look like?

Agriculture is an important and growing part of Canada’s economy.  Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the agriculture (Ag) sector are 10 per cent of the total and are increasing in real terms and as a proportion of the emissions' pie. Efforts in Canada (and globally) to reduce Ag sector emissions are falling short for well-known and legitimate reasons. Nature-based solutions have not emerged in a meaningful way. Much of the farming sector is resistant to change and top-down policies.

Crop insurance data offers a clear measure of climate-related threats to Canada’s food supply. Average annual crop-damage claims were approximately $1.28 billion in the decade from 2010 to 2020. In the three years post-2020, claims skyrocketed to an average of $3.17 billion annually. 

It doesn’t get more top-down or topsy-turvy than the recent antics of the President of the United States. With more than half of Canada’s agricultural exports going to the U.S., a 25 per cent tariff would be devastating, to say the least. That calls for a sharper focus on the priorities of the agriculture sector, which in turn requires an understanding of the priorities and importance of strong domestic markets and diverse international markets. 

The market for sustainable, non-GMO, and organic food continues to grow. Europe, for example, is well ahead of the global curve on sustainable agriculture and food products, and is an export market Canada should be eyeing. Sustainability is a competitive advantage that we can take advantage of, and add to our leadership in food safety and quality.         

There are different priorities for the large industrial farms and commodity growers, who represent a significant portion of economic activity and exports, versus small-scale farms that are large in number and focus on domestic markets and local demand. The solutions will look different, too. 

There are challenges in meeting farmland biodiversity objectives, reducing inputs, and managing greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, there is talk of increasing Canada’s agricultural exports significantly.  Squaring this circle of increasing production, while reducing emissions and managing biodiversity loss, seems almost impossible. Moreover, the contradiction these objectives present is not being confronted in any serious way in Canada. 

There needs to be a well-understood problem statement and a clearly defined set of objectives or outcomes if we are to answer the question of what a sustainable agricultural sector might look like. There is a great deal of generic talk about the extent to which technology, carbon offsets, more data and creating new financial mechanisms will help achieve more sustainable agriculture. Not having any consensus on an end-state means that most initiatives to date are random and disconnected pilots and demonstration projects. 

There is consensus on one solution; farmers need incentives to shift practices. Many countries have programs where governments pay farmers to protect wetlands, rivers, habitats, species and other biodiversity measures; referred to as ecosystem services.  

It is common practice in Europe, the U.K., Switzerland and Australia to pay farmers for ecosystem services.  Farmers in the U.S. (under the Conservation Reserve Program, for example), are paid to convert environmentally sensitive cropland to conservation uses, establish wildlife habitats, create pollinator habitats and protect wetlands. 

Canadian governments have not yet introduced comprehensive programs to pay farmers for ecosystem services. Instead, Canada favours traditional granting programs that support education and cover some costs of testing sustainable practices.  

For example, Canada created the On-Farm Climate Action Fund to help farmers with climate-resilient farm practices, thanks to the work of Farmers for Climate Solutions, a Canadian coalition.

There have been two general approaches to sustainability in the agri-food sector; top-down and bottom-up.  

Top-down efforts, such as organic food standards or net-zero commitments, tend to be global or national and somewhat generic, making local and regional adoption by farmers a challenge. Organic food standards have been hugely successful, creating markets in Europe and North America each exceeding US $50 billion. 

Bottom-up efforts at the local level (community-supported agriculture, local farm markets and farm demonstration projects) are important but end up being a patchwork of small, uneven activities that are not scalable.  

Fortunately, there is a growing wave of agri-food companies (Maple Leaf Foods, McCain, PepsiCo, Loblaw, General Mills, etc.) making commitments to driving a range of environmental improvements along their supply chains, often through commitments to “regenerative” agriculture. This has resulted in a growing, but still isolated and siloed, number of agri-food supply chain pilot collaboratives across the country.  

While this trend is encouraging, sustainability remains peripheral in most corporate agri-food settings, hence the need for support for farmers to transition to better practices. And these supports need to be integrated with agri-food company priorities and commitments. Scaling up and expanding pilot projects will require a readjustment to the incentives (both market and policy-based) that shape farming practices based on on-farm experiences. 

The innovation needed is a national standard that sets targets and benchmarks for soil carbon, nitrogen management, biodiversity and water quality. The standard needs to recognize variations according to crop, region, soil type, etc. This will need to be developed and led through collaboration with farmers. Ideally, this would be based on soil health and include, but not require, organic practices. The lack of standard definitions and common language may be an impediment to discussion, but should not be used as an excuse to avoid action. 

An agreed sustainable agriculture standard needs to be accompanied by a “sustainable agri-food transition plan” with a set of clear objectives, backed up by science and “real world” practice. It must be designed to provide a high-level, scalable framework built upon local and regional variation and experience. It must identify and incentivize opportunities for advancing farm practices supported and tested by farmers that lead to low emission, biodiverse, carbon-sequestering agricultural practices, while maintaining farm productivity and competitiveness.   

Three things are needed to make this happen at scale. 

First, farmers need to be compensated for the transition period of two to three years when new practices are tested and adopted, and yields may temporarily decline. 

Second, the agri-food sector, in conjunction with government programs, needs to develop a mature, enduring approach to payment for ecosystem services. 

Third, the incentives must be designed to support the transition to a measurable standard that defines and determines what sustainable, climate-resilient, “regenerative” agriculture looks like.  

As global markets spin, Canada has an opportunity to lead in feeding ourselves and the world with the highest-quality, most-sustainable food possible. It will take an unprecedented level of collaboration and vision, but we have no choice, and there is nothing but upside to being smart about how we grow our food. 

Bruce Lourie is president of the Ivey Foundation and co-author with Rick Smith of Slow Death by Rubber Duck: How the Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Life Affects Our Health.