Canada Food Security Plan Aims to Lower Prices, Reduce Imports

7b](40787xn38g5{[9b]g8[a_media_dl_1.png Bloomberg, Statistics Canada, BL

Article content

(Bloomberg) — Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government rolled out a plan to address food security and affordability as the high cost of groceries continues to be a major pain point for Canadian consumers. 

Article content

The strategy released Thursday earmarks C$3.2 billion ($2.3 billion) over ten years to increase competition in the grocery sector, process more food domestically and grow the country’s capacity to produce fruits and vegetables year-round. The plan includes new spending as well as redirected funds. 

Article content

Article content

Article content

“Canadian families will see lower prices at the grocery store, greater choice in where to shop and what to buy. It will mean that more of the products they buy will come from local producers and food processors based in Canada,” the government said in a document outlining the strategy. 

Article content

Article content

The plan represents an attempt by Carney’s government to respond to food inflation concerns and concentration in the grocery market. 

Article content

It also marks another example of Carney’s ongoing effort to concentrate essential supply chains in Canada rather than having them cross the southern border, insulating Canadian consumers from the whims of the Trump administration and its tariff policies.

Article content

The cost of groceries has become a political liability in Canada, following years of rapidly rising prices. Grocery prices in April were up 3.8% from a year ago and 31% higher than in April 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic first began. 

Article content

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has hammered the Liberal governments of both Justin Trudeau and Carney over the issue, while the left-leaning New Democratic Party has been calling for public grocery stores and a crackdown on surveillance pricing. 

Article content

Article content

The strategy includes a C$1 billion agri-food project finance fund to help small and medium-sized food processors expand, in an effort to process more food closer to where it’s grown in Canada.

Article content

“We grow things here, sell them to other countries who process them, then buy them back as final products,” the government said in its strategy outline. “This means higher prices for Canadians while creating jobs elsewhere.”

Article content

It also earmarks C$1 billion for food infrastructure, including food terminals and hubs, which the government says it will help independent grocers compete and give consumers the opportunity to buy directly from wholesalers and farmers. 

Article content

The government says it also wants to reduce the country’s dependence on imported crops, setting aside C$750 million for controlled environment agriculture to increase year-round production of fruits and vegetables in Canada. 

Article content

Building on its recent pledge to tackle surveillance pricing, the Carney government says it will modernize the law to ensure Canadians’ personal information is used “responsibly and transparently.” 

Article content

The government has set out key performance indicators for its plan, including beginning the construction of two new food terminals by the end of 2028 and increasing the proportion of local food sales by small and mid-sized producers by 25% by 2030.

Article content

It also wants the country’s competition watchdog — which will see it funding grow — to increase the number of investigations it opens per year by 10%, “resulting in close to C$450 million per year in consumer savings,” the government said in the document. 

Article content

—With assistance from Mario Baker Ramirez.

Article content