Angèle Poirier is a PhD candidate at the Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy at the University of Regina. She also holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in economics.
Angèle was born into a Francophone household in the rural Prairies and is still fluent in French. As a young adult, she was a grain farmer in Saskatchewan’s Parkland. Today, she is applying her farming background to her studies of Canada's fruit and vegetable supply chain.
Angèle serves her community by volunteering with Bike Regina and Regina Little Theatre. In her free time, she enjoys growing food, bike riding, and playing her harmonica.
Don't put all your eggplants in one basket: Imported non-tropical fruits and vegetables as Canada's food system vulnerability
Canada is highly dependent on imported non-tropical fruits and vegetables (F&Vs). In 2023, Canada relied on imports to satisfy 42% of total demand of non-tropical F&Vs, nearly double the level of import dependence in 1960 – 23%. Three-quarters of these non-tropical imports come from just two countries: the United States and Mexico. Being highly dependent on imports (having all our eggplants in one – well, two baskets) is a danger to Canada’s food supply and renders the food system vulnerable to many risks: crop failures in other jurisdictions, world price volatility, long and fragile supply chains, and trade wars. The paradox is that Canada, abundant in land and water, already grows many of the same non-tropical F&Vs which we currently spend over $7B/year importing. With enough competitively priced domestic production to displace imports of non-tropical F&Vs, this $7B/year could stay in the Canadian economy.
The purpose of this qualitative study is to identify the policies and institutions needed to boost Canada’s production of non-tropical F&Vs, thus decreasing import dependence and strengthening our food system.
RQ1: How did Canada, a large food producer, become highly import-dependent in F&Vs?
RQ2: What policies and institutions would increase Canada’s self-sufficiency in F&Vs?
Budget 2025 underscores sovereignty as Canada’s best response to global uncertainty. Displacing imports with Canadian production is sovereignty in practice. This study will contribute to Canada’s food sovereignty by delivering a governance blueprint for greater F&V self-sufficiency. Policymakers and food system actors will benefit by being presented with empirical evidence of how specific policies and institutions have historically affected import dependence, and how they might be reoriented to secure our food supply through greater self-sufficiency in non-tropical F&Vs. Without such a blueprint, Canada risks remaining import-dependent at a cost of $7B/year. To date, the IAD and SES frameworks have been applied to food waste and food processing, but never to food self-sufficiency, either independently or through the combined (CIS) framework. My proposed application of the CIS is an elegant response to this oversight because the CIS draws strength from both the dynamic IAD and the static SES frameworks.
