Some Observations Regarding Food, Migration, and Futures
Article by Ted Manning, CACOR
Can we feed the World, Can we feed Canada?
The ongoing discussion of Canada’s future is increasingly involving how Canada can feed its current and future population and or contribute to global foo security. CACOR’s ongoing discussions of population futures are interesting to follow. There are many different takes on the issue, and it sometimes feel that we are talking past each other. Many of the facts and trends brought forward and often extrapolated are informative but founded on different cultures, experiences, and assumptions. These seem to impede the logical and or culturally informed discussions of futures and expected consequences. There are a broad range of possible futures and how they are discusses clearly affect our assumptions, our goals and our understanding of Canada’s role in the world.
In 2022 Canada was the sixth largest food exporter in the world . “Annual Volume of food exports (Million Tons): 34.3 Annual Value of food exports (USD Millions): 23.2” Canada’s top food exports include wheat, canola, and beef. In 2022, Canada exported around $92.8 billion in food and agriculture products, including fish, seafood, and processed foods. Canada’s food exports are driven by its vast agricultural land and cold climate, ideal for growing certain crops. “ (https://finance.yahoo.com/news/top-20-food-exporting-countries-122951352.html?fr=yhssrp_catchall
It is also important to note that Canada is also a significant importer of food, with most from the USA, followed by France, Italy, Brazil, and Mexico. Much of the fresh produce on Canadian shelves is imported, most notably in winter. Depending on how food is valued/priced/ and exchange rates calculated, in some years there is an approximate balance of value between imports and exports. .
As Canada reaches 40 million people, it is essential to look broadly at what this means – both for current residents of Canada and for those who may arrive. (And also, for those who do not come to Canada) Many have asked what Canada’s capacity is to house, feed and support growing numbers.
Nearly 1 million new residents in one year. (2022) was the largest growth and growth rate in population ever registered for Canada and included immigrants, refugees, and temporary residents (such as those seeking temporary sanctuary from war and those in Canada to study).
Two factors are central; What is the overall long-term capacity for Canada to sustain a growing population? Are there limits and what do they mean? And what is the current capacity to accommodate and integrate growing numbers?
When we discuss capacity, we need to look both at ultimate human/biosphere relationships as well as current and projected capacity of the nation to absorb new residents successfully. That is, we need to look both at ultimate limits and temporary barriers and opportunities.
As our discussions have shown, there are many different reactions to the numbers – both to totals and to rates of change. Clearly the arrivals have stressed the system … is this likely to be short-term or have a longer-term positive or negative impact? How different observers react to this question is based significantly on their assumptions and how these play out over time.
What are we assuming? (Some examples follow)
Assumptions:
- Regarding our ability to devise or implement new solutions at any scale –
are there promising solutions or are we assuming a static situation?
- Relating to the behaviours of those who stay or migrate? Will they change their activities, or will they alter them (possibly to match the new limits and opportunities?)
- Regarding the consumption patterns of our current population and their potential for modification- Will new arrivals adapt to the current pattern or cause it to change (for good or bad?) Do new arrivals have different consumption wants or needs, or quickly adjust to those in Canada? (Note the rapid changes in food habits reflecting a much wider range of cuisines now common in Canada, much of which was not readily available in past decades).
- Will residents or newcomers adopt new habits? (Can they change e.g., food habits , car or other transport use, expected size of residences or are they tied totally to what they eat today (sorry no bananas but have you tried parsnips) or to smaller or larger homes or attitudes towards intergenerational residences?
- Is agriculture adaptive? – most of the models show much capacity for change in types of crops, intensity, suitable locations, and places where new climate regimes may be shifted? Modelling shows much more flexibility than many expect, depending on what methods are pursued and where..
- Are there different patterns of how we use ecosystems (similar ecological areas in e.g., Northern China do support many more people per square kilometre at reasonable lifestyles – but at much different patterns of consumption.
- What will change in our climate and where? Can we show how much can be produced in Canada under what conditions – and how accurate are we able to model?
- That the government has the capacity to influence peoples consumption patterns and to limit excesses – different regulations and standards can permit a much broader range of options than are now common.
- That Canadians will willingly adapt to changed lifestyles and quantities of consumption. – pushback is likely to be an important variable.
- That resources will be redirected to support key parts of our life support system –
- And what other assumptions are we making regarding our futures?
Do we need to question these assumptions? Yes. Our modeling of the range of not-impossible futures depends on clarity in our assumptions. Different consumption patterns strongly affect the amount of resources (including agricultural land and water).
I tender these questions because they are analogous to those we did forty years ago in our work with IIASA modeling of agricultural futures in Europe, work with Guelph University and the Canada Geographical Information System in Canada on spatial applications of futures modeling to resource fields, and also the approaches which Rob Hoffman continued to do in targeted modeling through his company whatIf? Technologies for specific applications of futures modeling in Canada and with CoR colleagues. When we tried modelling probable or not-impossible futures, running our models hundreds of times to see where, when different assumptions and combinations of assumptions were made it was possible to identify which ecosystems were most flexible, which would be most important in the widest range of likely futures, and therefore where to predict what should be conserved for futures. This is still possible and under most scenarios Canada comes out OK – but some activities will have to adapt, new crops or procedures will become necessary in many areas where heat or rainfall regimes are most likely to change. It is possible to estimate where certain ecosystems needed for particular activities are likely to migrate… and possibly to anticipate future conditions amenable to what we need for crops and livestyles..
To conclude, when we speak of futures it is exceptionally complex to predict either biophysical or human changes or reactions – but it never hurts to try.
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