The system is failing to meet demand, depending on foreign product, and driving up costs at the grocery store
Canada’s supply management system — once heralded as a pillar of food security and agricultural self-sufficiency — is failing at its most basic function: Ensuring reliable domestic supply.
According to the latest figures from the Canadian Association of Regulated Importers (CARI), Canada imported more than 66.9 million kilograms of chicken as of June 14 — a 54.6% increase from the same period last year. To put that in perspective, this volume could feed 3.4 million Canadians for an entire year, based on per capita poultry consumption. That’s roughly 446 million individual meals — meals that, under a tightly managed quota system, were meant to be produced domestically.
