Approximately 733 million people face hunger globally. The causes are not primarily scarcity — global food production is sufficient to feed the current world population. The causes are distribution, conflict, poverty, climate disruption, and policy failures at national and international levels. Canada cannot solve these problems unilaterally, but it can act with more coherence, more accountability, and more genuine partnership than it currently does.
Canada has resources that are relevant to global food security: agricultural expertise, food aid financing capacity, multilateral influence through international organisations, and a domestic food system that, despite its own significant waste and inequality problems, generates surpluses. This article defines how those resources should be deployed and how Canada should account for its international food security commitments.
This article is also about domestic food insecurity, which affects millions of Canadians — disproportionately Indigenous communities, low-income households, and people in remote areas. The connection between domestic and international food systems — in agricultural policy, in waste, in climate resilience — is real and should be acknowledged in policy design.
1. Food security is a right, not a charity. The right to food is recognised in international human rights law. Canada has ratified the ICESCR. Policy framing matters: treating food aid as generosity allows it to be withdrawn when it becomes politically inconvenient. Treating it as a rights obligation creates a different kind of accountability.
2. Effective food assistance is demand-driven, not supply-driven. Food aid that exports donor-country agricultural surpluses in ways that undercut local markets does not build food security — it undermines it. Canada's international food security investments should prioritise: local and regional procurement, support for smallholder farmer production, and infrastructure that builds recipient-country food system resilience.
3. Climate and food security are inseparable. Climate change is one of the largest drivers of food insecurity, through drought, floods, heat stress on crops, and disruption to traditional food production. Canada's climate commitments (Article 10) and its international food security commitments are the same policy at different scales. They must be coherent.
4. Domestic food waste is an international food system issue. Canada wastes approximately 58% of food produced — over $49 billion annually. Reducing domestic food waste is not just an environmental or economic issue; it is also a demonstration that wealthy countries are willing to take seriously the same resource efficiency they expect from food aid recipients.
5. Partnership means sharing authority, not setting conditions. Canada's international food security programs should be designed and governed in genuine partnership with recipient-country governments, civil society, and the communities most affected. Programs that are designed in Ottawa and delivered to communities without their meaningful participation in design and governance tend to fail. This is not a preference — it is an evidence-based observation about what works.
International food security funding commitment Commit to maintaining Canada's international food assistance and food security development spending at a published minimum level as a percentage of Official Development Assistance, reviewed at each governance cycle. The commitment is published in advance and tracked publicly. Where spending falls below the commitment, Parliament receives an explanation and a timeline for restoration.
Local and regional food procurement priority Align Canada's international food assistance with World Food Programme and FAO best practices for local and regional procurement: purchasing food in or near recipient countries rather than shipping Canadian surpluses, wherever market conditions allow. Publish the percentage of Canada's food aid spending that is locally or regionally procured, annually. Set an improvement target reviewed at each governance cycle.
Smallholder farmer support Direct a defined portion of Canada's international agricultural development spending to programs that strengthen smallholder farming capacity: crop storage, seed access, water management, market access, and financial services. Priority for programs that specifically support women farmers, who produce the majority of food in many food-insecure regions. Outcome data published annually.
Climate-resilient agriculture Integrate climate resilience requirements into all Canada-funded international agricultural development projects: crop variety selection for climate stress tolerance, water management for drought and flood conditions, agroforestry and soil health practices that sequester carbon and improve resilience simultaneously. Canada's international food security and climate financing are coordinated, not managed as separate envelopes.
Domestic food waste reduction Set a federal domestic food waste reduction target, aligned with sustainable development goal SDG 12.3 (halving per-capita global food waste at retail and consumer levels by 2030). Federal action includes:
- Procurement reform to specify imperfect produce in federal food purchasing
- Recovery and redistribution infrastructure grants for food banks, food rescue organisations, and community kitchens
- Date labelling standardisation to reduce premature disposal
- Annual federal food waste measurement and reporting
Domestic food insecurity — federal responsibility Federal transfers to provinces and territories that support food programs — school nutrition, community food programs, Indigenous community food security — are tracked in a public dashboard by program, jurisdiction, and outcomes served. Federal nutrition programs (Canada Child Benefit, Old Age Security) are evaluated for their contribution to food security in their effectiveness reviews.
- International food security spending commitment is published and maintained, with annual tracking against commitment level.
- Local and regional procurement percentage in Canada's food aid programs increases annually, with targets published.
- Climate-resilient agriculture integration is documented in 100% of new Canada-funded agricultural development projects within two years.
- Federal food waste measurement programme is operational within two years, with annual data published in machine-readable format.
- Federal domestic food security program tracking dashboard is live within 18 months.
- Smallholder farmer support spending published annually with disaggregation by gender and geographic reach of supported programs.