Showcasing Canada on the global stage

The United Nations Food Systems Summit will be held in New York City in September 2021. The Summit will launch bold new actions to deliver progress on all 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), each of which relies to some degree on healthier, more sustainable and equitable food systems. These are ambitious and important goals, and ones that Canada’s innovative agrifood sector can contribute to.

The summit will welcome key players from the worlds of science, business, policy, healthcare and academia, as well as farmers, Indigenous people, youth organizations, consumer groups, environmental activists and other key stakeholders, to have discussions and come up with solutions that address some of the world’s most pressing challenges around food security, nutrition and climate change.

As a global leader in agriculture and food, Canada has an important voice at the Summit. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the Canadian agriculture and agrifood supply chain has remained resilient, ensuring those who rely on our food domestically, and internationally, receive it. All while employing millions of Canadians and being a driver of Canada’s economic recovery.

The Summit will be a critical forum to champion Canada’s agricultural leadership on issues such as food security, climate change resiliency and supply chain strength. This is an important stage to showcase Canadian priorities. A key focus of Canada’s message at the summit needs to be innovation, sustainability and regulatory matters. Canadian agriculture is part of the solution, and this position must be championed.

Our global partners can learn from our leadership and the benefit of having a vibrant agriculture and agrifood sector. Most importantly, they can learn that a progressive and competitive agrifood system is compatible with environmental sustainability through a commitment to innovation.

In the months leading up to the Summit, close collaboration between industry and government is vital. This must include the whole agriculture and agrifood supply chain: input manufacturing, transportation, science and research, producers, and processors. Each are part of the solution to meeting both our food security objectives and our economic and export-based goals.