CHARLEBOIS: Ottawa’s food fix falls short
· Toronto Sun
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Canadians cannot eat a budget announcement. They need their grocery money to go further. That is the test Ottawa’s latest fiscal plan must pass, regardless of how many billions appear beside the word affordability.
This week’s federal budget contains worthwhile measures for agriculture and food. Investments in processing, distribution and domestic production deserve recognition. But it still reads more like a collection of programs than a coherent plan to make Canada’s food economy more competitive.
The distinction matters because households have little room left to absorb higher costs.
Our household salary-and-expense comparison, expressed in constant 2025 dollars, shows the remaining annual cushion falling from $6,968 in 2016 to a projected $6,183 in 2026. After food, shelter, transportation and income taxes, that represents approximately 11% less purchasing power for everything else.
This is an illustrative comparison, rather than a description of every household. But the pressure it captures is familiar. Mortgage payments and rent are difficult to negotiate. Taxes are compulsory. Driving to work is often unavoidable. Food becomes the household budget’s shock absorber.
Families switch brands, buy cheaper proteins and postpone purchases. Some simply eat less. Calling that consumer resilience misses the point. Canadians are adjusting because they have to.
Feds right to offer assistance for households struggling to buy food
Ottawa is right to offer immediate assistance. The proposed $4.1-billion Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit Supplement would arrive in early 2027, providing up to $339 for a single adult without children or $679 for a couple with two children.
For households struggling to buy food, that money matters. Dismissing it would be unfair. Confusing it with a solution to food inflation would be equally misguided.
A cheque helps someone pay a high price. It does not, by itself, reduce the cost of producing, processing or transporting food.
The budget also proposes $124 million over three years for the Local Food Infrastructure Fund and $610.3 million over four years for Nutrition North Canada and related initiatives, beginning in 2027–28. These commitments should be judged by access to food and benefits reaching households.
Several bigger economic measures were announced earlier, including June’s $3.2-billion National Food Security Strategy, the Productivity Mega Deduction and temporary fuel excise-tax relief. Repeating them in a budget does not make them new.
Nor does an impressive headline guarantee sufficient ambition. Spread over 10 years, the food strategy amounts to roughly $7.66 per Canadian annually.
For perspective, projected mandatory spending across U.S. Farm Bill programs averages approximately C$562 per American annually. Excluding nutrition assistance, it is about C$159.
Those figures are not directly comparable. The Farm Bill encompasses established agricultural supports and nutrition programs, while Canada’s strategy is only one part of our spending. Still, Washington’s framework demonstrates the scale, vision and continuity of its commitment. Canada needs comparable strategic discipline, with clear priorities and measurable results.
Start with the Canadian Dairy Commission. Its mandate, governance and pricing transparency deserve an independent review. Producer stability is legitimate. Consumer affordability must also have a visible place in decisions affecting an essential food category.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency needs similar scrutiny. Modernizing fines and enforcement powers cannot substitute for improving the regulator’s own performance. Businesses need published approval timelines, transparent backlog reporting and accountability when avoidable delays block investment.
A food processor waiting for an approval cannot manufacture productivity. A greenhouse project trapped in administrative uncertainty cannot supply Canadian vegetables.
Citizens need transparancy on what their money built
Financing programs and tax incentives should therefore face a public scorecard. How much processing capacity was added? How much private investment materialized? Did productivity improve? Were projects completed on schedule?
Canadians deserve to know what their money built, not merely which fund received it.
Import quotas also require greater transparency. Ottawa controls valuable access to protected markets. Canadians should know who receives allocations, how transfers operate and whether these arrangements add costs or disadvantage smaller processors. Publicly administered market access should come with public accountability.
Transportation policy needs consistency. Temporary diesel-tax relief can ease pressure, but food businesses plan beyond a tax holiday. Ottawa should explain how restoring those taxes will affect distribution costs, particularly in rural and remote communities.
That strategy should explain where Canada intends to expand production, how smaller businesses can compete and which barriers Ottawa will remove first. Otherwise, spending risks reinforcing the inefficiencies consumers already finance.
None of this requires abandoning support for vulnerable Canadians. It requires connecting that support to a credible economic strategy.
Transfers address immediate hardship. Productive farms, efficient processors and competitive distribution networks create the conditions for lasting affordability. Regulators must help that system function while protecting consumers.
The budget offers useful ingredients. What remains missing is a convincing recipe, with someone accountable for the outcome.
Ottawa should stop treating the size of an announcement as proof of progress. Canadians will measure success at the checkout, and they will keep measuring it after the next benefit payment has been spent.
— Sylvain Charlebois is director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University, co-host of The Food Professor Podcast.