As I eat my breakfast of oatmeal and blueberries this morning, I’m glad I live in Canada and can trust my food. Really, I can’t remember the last time I was about to eat something and thought for a second it might not be safe for me. It is just assumed in our country food is safe – and for good reason. Canada is consistently recognized as having one of the safest food systems in the world. From production on our farms, through distribution, to retail, and to food service, there are countless safeguards in place to ensure public safety. 

Despite Canada’s very high standards of food safety, food producers still often find themselves defending the safety of their products to the public. Healthy discussion is great and important, however, in the disinformation age of “fake news,” there are certainly many instances where a loud minority have simply accused producers of unsafe practices – almost invariably with scant supporting information. These types of campaigns have resulted in a strange juxtaposition in society where recent surveys show public trust remains high of farmers but not necessarily in farming.

The ongoing debate recently inspired the parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food to move on February 19thto undertake a study on the public perception of the Canadian agriculture and agri-food sector. Its objective is to understand challenges and opportunities to improve public trust in agriculture. Of course, one of the aspects most often receiving public interest is around crop protection. The recent Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) statement and subsequent news stories around the use of glyphosate in Canada is a perfect example. So, for the record, let’s take a closer look into the steps that help ensure safety in crop protection.

To start off, crop protection is highly regulated in Canada – almost to the same degree as the pharmaceutical industry. Before any crop protection product can be used on a Canadian farm it must first be registered and approved by the PMRA in Ottawa. Registration requires that it be proven effective and also not present unacceptable risks to human health and the environment. Hundreds of federal scientists with expertise ranging from toxicology, human and animal health, and environmental science are part of teams reviewing these crop protection products.  

Upon registration in Canada, the PMRA then also establishes a maximum residue limit (MRL) that is a legally enforceable limit on the amount of residues that can be found in any food item as a result of approved product use. The PMRA sets these science-based MRLs at levels well below the amount that could pose a health concern to ensure that the food Canadians eat is safe. Foods of both domestic and imported origin are then subject to this limit. If any fresh or processed food item contains residues in excess of the specified MRL, then it can be considered to be adulterated or contaminated and be removed from the marketplace. Ensuring adherence to the MRLs is then accomplished both before and after food is harvested. 

Before food is harvested, PMRA assigns a pre-harvest interval for every crop protection product and crop that determines when the last application can be made prior to its harvest to prevent any unacceptable residues in food. It is then the producer’s responsibility to ensure they are not using any product too close to harvest. Major food retailers such as Loblaw and Sobeys will require producers to be enrolled in a food safety program such as CanadaGAP to sell products in their stores. Food safety programs include following these pre-harvest intervals as a requirement and independent auditors will regularly examine them during on-farm inspections.

Following harvest, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) conducts random residue testing in the marketplace on both domestic and imported food items to determine if they are in compliance with the assigned residue limits. Termed the National Chemical Residue Monitoring Program (NCRMP), the CFIA publishes this data for public review. In 2014-2015, the most recent year that data is available, the CFIA conducted more than 100,000 tests for residues of veterinary drugs, pesticides, metals, and other contaminants on more than 14,000 food samples collected across Canada. For fresh and processed fruit and vegetable products produced in Canada, CFIA determined that just 30 samples of the 1485 tested were not compliant with established Canadian limits – a compliance rate of 98 per cent. Consistent with previous years, the CFIA summarized the annual report by stating “the overwhelming majority of food on the market meets Canadian standards for food safety.”

As long as we have pests, we will continue to need ways of controlling them – be that through the use of crop protection products or other means. Canadians can be confident that there is extensive regulatory oversight on the use of these products and monitoring data from actual food samples confirm that system is working. This is why food with “Product of Canada” is highly regarded in export markets as some of the safest products available. A little gratitude is due to our producers who have established themselves as amongst the best in the world. Now, what’s for lunch?