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In 2015, Canada pledged to halve food waste and losses in the entire supply chain, from farm to plate, by 2030 in accordance with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 12.3. Eight years later, Canada, unlike many countries, is working hard to achieve this goal.

Environmental and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) spokesperson Samantha Bayard (Samantha Bayard) said that recent research estimates that 20% to 30% of all food produced in the country each year will become food loss or waste ——Most of them will be landfilled or incinerated. The Canadian government is responsible for coordinating environmental policies and plans.

This loss and waste runs through the entire supply chain. The author of the government report "Inventory: Reducing Food Loss and Waste in Canada" pointed out that solving problems at every step of the process can save Canadians money, improve the competitiveness of the agri-food sector, and help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The locations and causes of food loss and waste in the food chain (such as production, transportation, processing, and retail).

Bayard said that Canada’s public and private sectors are working to better understand and resolve these issues, although there are still opportunities to strengthen and strengthen these efforts.

From the federal government’s investment in research and infrastructure to provincial and municipal action plans, the fight against food waste is ongoing. Here is an in-depth understanding of what some of these entities are doing:

Starting at the federal level, the researchers working for the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment identified these as common challenges across Canada:

In 2020, the Canadian government has set two main goals to try to solve these problems:

1) Develop new methods to increase the number of landfills that collect and process methane, and ensure that landfills that already operate these systems are improved to collect as much as possible.

2) Explore opportunities to support waste and biosolids management infrastructure, including composting, anaerobic digestion, and landfill methane collection and use.

In addition, ECCC has also issued a technical document on the treatment of municipal solid waste organic matter, which provides technical information as a reference for local governments when evaluating methods of handling organic waste.

In addition to resources, the Canadian government also invests in waste management infrastructure, such as through the Low Carbon Economic Fund (LCEF) and the Investment Canadian Infrastructure Program (ICIP). Some examples include: BC's Organics Infrastructure Program, which uses LCEF funds to support multiple organics processing projects. The city of Peterborough, Ontario has received funding from LCEF to apply for a citywide organic waste collection and composting program that is expected to be launched in the fall of 2023.

At the provincial level, British Columbia, Ontario, and Quebec have developed their own action plans.

For example, Ontario’s priorities include:

Work with municipalities; industrial, commercial, and institutional sectors; and non-profit organizations to develop educational tools and resources to prevent food waste. The province hopes to increase the recycling of resources in the school community through waste audits, seminars and skills development courses in the school community. Its interest lies in cooperating with food service providers, retailers, wholesalers and manufacturers to save surplus food for donations and promote the development of value-added products. Ontario has been working to develop a data collection mechanism to measure progress in reducing waste and recycling food and organic waste.

According to RECYC-QUÉBEC, 60% of Quebec's cities provide source-separated organic matter collection or home/community composting. But like the surrounding provinces, it still has a big problem: it generates about 1.5 million tons of food, yards, and other compostable waste each year, which accounts for 30% of the waste it handles.

Among its goals, Quebec has set a goal of implementing organic management on 100% of municipal territories by 2025, and has adopted a multi-pronged approach. The province is working to resolve the barriers to transfer caused by cheap disposal rates. One of the strategies is to reduce garbage collection and/or limit how much garbage residents can leave on the side of the road, while providing more frequent collection and collection, and not limiting the amount of recyclables that can be discarded.

Quebec’s action plan includes information and public awareness components supported by the National Zero Waste Committee; research on food loss and waste (in progress); and a recent study on the link between packaging and food loss.

Many cities have set their own goals to reduce food waste and implemented organic waste management and promotion plans.

Perhaps Canada has made the most progress at the local level; according to data from the Environmental Research and Education Foundation of Canada (EREF-Canada), 83% of Canadians live in areas where roadside leaves and yard waste programs are available, and 71% of them You can participate in the roadside source separation organic program.

Some examples of municipal work include the City of Toronto’s long-term waste strategy, the Greater Vancouver Regional Food System Action Plan, and the York Region’s Good Food Plan.

For more information on Canada's performance in the field of organic waste management, please refer to the EREF-Canada July 2021 report, The State of Organic Waste Management and Collection Practices in Canada. It looks at all 10 provinces and three regions to measure organic waste policies and approval/licensing systems; the availability of national organic waste transfer plans; the number, capacity, and tonnage of organic waste treatment facilities; and goals or targets.

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