Development and implementation of tools and strategies to address greenhouse gas emissions in Canada's food system: Decarbonizing Canada's Food Supply Chain

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Food loss and waste (FLW) in North America totals over 168 million tonnes annually creating significant direct and indirect social, economic, and environmental disruptions, including the emission of anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs). In fact, Canada's food supply chain may contribute as much as 40% of total emissions. Comprehensive strategies to address the root causes of these GHGs do not exist and accurate data are sorely lacking across most food sectors. GHG gas data across the food system is fragmented across scientific literature, consultation reports by provincial governments or industry stakeholders, and with non-governmental organizations at the grassroots level. As a result, there is a significant lack of cohesive information, particularly from the industrial, commercial, and institutional (IC&I) sector, who face challenges accessing resources to minimize or divert organics. This project aims to bring together fragmented reporting and information to build an open access database system and to quantify food system GHG emissions, from farm to fork, in Canada. The learned experiences from this project will be used to develop climate action strategies at a community level. This will be achieved through direct measurements, community-based pilot projects, and modeling analysis in partnership with diverse stakeholders. This is a collaboration of experts with the experience to address the scientific and human dimensions of the food system. The goal is to develop publicly available tools to assess GHG emissions, share climate action strategies with interested parties, and train new professionals to work in these fields. The project will generate meaningful actions and policies that will result in significant and sustainable reductions in anthropogenic GHGs across Canada's food supply chain.