Canada’s Food System: Building Momentum Toward September

The first hundred days of Canada’s Food System were designed to build a strong foundation for the campaign. This early phase focused on testing creative, establishing our presence across digital platforms, gathering insights on how Canadians engage with our messages, and bringing new partners and audiences into the initiative. The intention was to start building momentum with consistent steps that would prepare the campaign for its next stage this fall.

Since the campaign began in May, our messages have been seen over 22 million times on Facebook, and engagement has far surpassed industry benchmarks. On YouTube, Canadians are not only watching our videos but staying with them.

Community engagement is also growing. To date, over 1,900 Canadians have signed our pledge, with new user-generated content flowing in each month. Social channels continue to expand, with hundreds of new followers added across social media. These conversations underscore the appetite for real stories about the people, innovation, and collaboration behind Canadian food.

Instagram has been a standout performer during the campaign’s first hundred days. Cumulatively, the platform has reached tens of thousands of Canadians and consistently delivered strong engagement on posts tied to our contests and “Future of Food” themes. Story formats have been especially effective, driving thousands of views and interactions, while the creative use of Giphy stickers generated thousands of downloads. For a sector-wide initiative without consumer products to promote, these results show that Canadians are choosing to interact with our content and share it in their own networks. It is a strong signal of authentic engagement.

We also took the campaign on the road this summer at the Calgary Stampede, one of Canada’s largest public events. Thousands of Canadians visited our activation, engaging directly with campaign messages, taking the pledge, and learning more about the people and innovation behind Canada’s food system. This face-to-face presence reinforced the digital campaign and brought the initiative to life for Canadians in a hands-on, memorable way.

Another major milestone has been the number of partners joining the initiative. From the very beginning, we have been supported by key organizations including the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA), MNP, Mowi, Egg Farmers of Ontario (EFO), Egg Farmers of Canada (EFC), The Canadian Hatching Egg Producers (CHEP), Farm Credit Canada (FCC), the Canadian Cattle Association, and Richardson International. These founding partners laid the groundwork for the initiative’s launch and continue to provide essential leadership.

Alongside them, essential partners such as Canadian Food Focus (CFF), Farm & Food Care Ontario, and The Canadian Agricultural Human Resource Council (CARHC) have been instrumental in ensuring the campaign reflects the full breadth of Canada’s food system. Most recently, we welcomed Agriculture in the Classroom as our newest essential partner, helping us expand reach into education and youth audiences. In addition, new sector organizations, including the Animal Nutrition Association of Canada (ANAC), Dairy Farmers of Canada (DFC), Turkey Farmers of Canada (TFC), and the Canadian Canola Growers Association (CCGA), have joined the campaign, bringing valuable perspectives from across the value chain. Together, this growing coalition strengthens our ability to deliver a unified message to Canadians.

Looking ahead, the campaign is shifting into its next phase with the September launch of the cornerstone campaign. This phase will expand our reach into broadcast media, ensuring Canadians encounter our messages in mainstream national outlets. Alongside broadcast, we will continue investing in paid social, digital advertising, and earned media, giving the initiative both scale and depth.

A key storytelling platform will be the new Canada’s Food System audio docuseries, now in post-production. Each episode will take Canadians behind the stories of our food, from modern farming and aquaculture to supply chains, exports, and careers. The series will be promoted widely through broadcast spots, podcast platforms, and influencer partnerships, all with a call-to-action to visit the campaign website.

Equally important, we are introducing a measurement framework that tracks four pillars of success: awareness, engagement, trust, and conversion. This framework ensures that we are not just counting clicks or views but measuring how effectively we are building long-term trust in Canada’s food system. It complements the research program being led with Ipsos, which began with qualitative work earlier this summer and will expand into a national quantitative survey this fall. These insights will help ensure the campaign continues to deliver credible, trusted messages that reflect the priorities of Canadians.

This builds on the work already underway by our team. Earlier this year, CCFI’s Ashley Bruner hosted a webinar that reviewed the research we had been gathering and curating over the past several months, providing partners with a deeper look into the drivers of public trust and consumer perceptions. Looking ahead, Ashley will host a more comprehensive research webinar this fall, bringing together our curated research, newly obtained studies, and CCFI’s own annual public trust research. This will provide partners with a robust, evidence-based picture of where Canadians stand. She will also offer practical tools and tips to help organizations leverage this information to their advantage, ensuring the insights can be applied directly in their own work.

Every pledge, share, and conversation sparked by this campaign is more than a metric. It is a signal that Canadians want to better understand and engage with their food system, strengthening public trust at a time when it matters most. As the campaign grows, so too does the opportunity for more organizations to join this national effort to elevate food in the minds of Canadians.

We will be offering a more fulsome review of the first hundred days, and a more detailed look at what is to come in the fall, in an upcoming industry-wide call. This will give all partners a chance to hear the story so far, see the full set of results, and prepare for the cornerstone campaign launch.

With strong early results, a growing roster of partners, a robust measurement strategy, and a media plan that now includes broadcast and audio storytelling, Canada’s Food System is well-positioned to be recognized as part of our national infrastructure: an economic engine, a source of pride, and a foundation for public trust.