The Next Course

Atypical food production technologies hold promise for increasing food production and productivity while improving the resilience of food systems in Canada. To best support Canada’s food systems against contemporary and future challenges, a better knowledge of atypical food production will be instrumental in guiding researchers, developers, investors, decision-makers, and the public in making informed choices.

Report findings

• Technological advancement in controlled environment agriculture (CEA) facilities and their components are targeted at increasing production and improving profitability, energy efficiency, environmental sustainability, food safety, nutritional quality and flavour, and suitability for adverse climates.
• To be successful, CEA depends on enabling technologies (e.g., AI, robotics, sensors), resources (e.g., energy, water), and conditions (e.g., access to labour, funding, regulatory approval).
• Changes in consumer preferences and the potential benefits of a diversified food system for improving resilience suggest a role for atypical protein in the Canadian food system. However, atypical protein production faces considerable technical and scale-up challenges.
• Cellular agriculture (e.g., cultured meat, precision fermentation) holds promise to expand Canada’s protein portfolio, while research efforts in plant-based meat alternatives are focused on improving production processes and consumer appeal.
• Empowering local project leadership, including through meaningful upfront consultation and collaboration, increases the chance of success for atypical food production operations by ensuring projects are mindful of local infrastructure and labour contexts, and aligned with community needs and desires.
• Gene editing can tailor variants and optimize plant performance for growing conditions in CEA operations, improving productivity and expanding the types of foods that can be produced indoors.
• Robotics and automation can improve productivity and lower labour costs but may not be accessible or appropriate for smaller operations.
• AI supports an increasing number of activities across atypical production, from hardware control to simulations for operations or training. AI may also support processes in biomanufacturing and biotechnology, benefitting atypical protein production.
• Atypical food production methods require infrastructure inputs (e.g., energy, water, internet) that can be less reliable or affordable in northern, remote, or Indigenous communities than in other regions of Canada.
• CEA requires both manual and highly skilled labour. While labour shortages and skill mismatches complicate recruitment, automation and robotics add to upfront costs.
• Food production is under shared jurisdictional authority, with a governance landscape shaped by field-based agriculture. Obtaining approval for some atypical production facilities and products may challenge existing regulatory mechanisms due to incompatibilities with land-use policy and a lack of comparator products for assessing food safety risks.
• Advances and innovation in atypical food production technologies will affect only a small portion of the greater food system. Furthermore, these technologies will not address the root causes of food insecurity in Canada.