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Winter
2018
Grains
West
12
THE
FARMGATE
VOXPOPULI
AGRICULTURE SLOWLYGROWSCONSENSUS
PUBLIC TRUST IS A FUNNY THING.
You can’t touch, taste, smell, feel or see
it, but it’s there. It’s always there. With
no concrete traits, the concept of some-
thing as large as public trust can be hard
to gauge, yet it has become increasingly
important to people and companies across
all Canadian industries.
In agriculture, this communal confi-
dence often boils down to a handful of
wide-scale concerns, according to the
latest data from the Canadian Centre for
Food Integrity (CCFI). The Guelph-based
non-profit focuses on providing clear,
unbiased information to average con-
sumers related to Canada’s food system
and to provide those consumers with an
articulate understanding of Canada’s food
system, from farm to fork.
Its 2017 public trust research was
released this past September at a summit
in Calgary, and the big takeaway was that
Canada’s food system has made sizable
gains. Of the 1,300 Canadians surveyed,
43 per cent believe our system is moving
in the right direction (up from 30 per cent
in 2016), while another 43 per cent are
unsure (50 per cent in 2016) and only 14
per cent would say it’s headed down the
wrong track (21 per cent in 2016). All of
these are positive indicators if you ask
CCFI president Crystal Mackay.
“When you see a shift, it means some-
thing, because data is consistent year over
year,” she said. “There’s good support and
love for Canadian food and farming, trust
in food safety, and access to information.
Those are all pieces.”
Of those polled, six in 10 identified two
issues as front and centre: the rising cost
of food and keeping healthy food afforda-
ble. Even as demographics were broken
out into cohorts of moms, millennials and
foodies, these two concerns didn’t budge.
In fact, the answers remain unchanged
from last year, and were both ranked
higher than questions related to health
care and the economy. “I’m surprised they
maintained the top two positions,” said
Mackay. “The public has just reminded
us of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. We
sometimes forget how important it is to
feed our country.”
Among other survey results, respondents
appear to have genuine worries about many
of the same issues as farmers. Fifty-one per
cent of people said they were concerned
about the use of hormones in farm animals,
up three points from last year. And 48 per
cent of people remarked that they are con-
cerned about the use of pesticides in crop
production. Despite all these concerns, 49
per cent of Canadians still said they trust
food produced in Canada more than that
produced in other countries. That can
be a big opportunity or a colossal failure,
depending on whether you view the glass
as half full or half empty.
“This is being served up on a plate,”
said Mackay, regarding the number of
consumers searching for information.
“I’m an optimist. I think with Canadians
and earning public trust, our sector is in a
position of strength.”
She added that consumers want to en-
gage with people in Canada’s food system,
but they don’t know where to begin. It’s
about putting yourself out there, in her
estimation. “Our public is saying, ‘just
because we don’t know about farming
doesn’t mean we are idiots,’” she said. Our
public is saying, ‘we’re valuing trustwor-
thy information.’ When people Google
information, they’re not finding it.”
The report’s findings don’t raise the
eyebrows of Sylvain Charlebois, however.
The dean and professor of food distribu-
tion and policy studies at Dalhousie in
Halifax, NS, said Canada is not an equal
playing field.
“In B.C. and Quebec, the discussion
around the future of food in general, it’s a
little bit more elaborate than in other plac-
es around the country,” he said, adding
Alberta was better than average, but not
in the top tier.
Charlebois credits the CCFI for taking
charge of the conversation and docu-
menting how consumers feel regarding
Canada’s food system. As a professor of
mostly millennials, Charlebois knows that
the next generation is the one the industry
needs to watch out for.
In its annual survey of 1,300 Canadians, the Canadian Centre for Food Integrity found top consumer life concerns include the rising cost of food (62 per cent)
and keeping healthy food affordable (61 per cent). Below are a number of other central concerns.