At the Root: perspectives on growing a strong Northern food sector

Canada’s Agri-Food Future Won’t Be Built Without Rural, Northern, and Indigenous Entrepreneurs

Canada is rightly proud of its agri-food sector. We have vast land, abundant water, world-class research, and food systems shaped by Indigenous knowledge and generations of farmers.

But the sector is at a turning point.

Global demand for sustainable food is rising. Climate change is reshaping how we grow. Labour shortages are accelerating automation. Supply chains are becoming more fragile. These pressures are often framed as challenges—but they are also opportunities.

Seizing them requires more than policy tweaks or new technologies. It requires entrepreneurship: the ability to turn ideas into viable enterprises, create value locally, and build resilient food systems.

And this is where Canada is falling behind—especially in remote, rural, and Indigenous communities.

Entrepreneurship is what transforms raw commodities into high-value products. It’s how communities move from exporting unprocessed goods to building brands, capturing markets, and creating jobs. Whether it’s northern berries becoming nutraceuticals, traditional foods reaching premium markets, or remote fisheries strengthening local supply chains, entrepreneurship drives resilience. Commerce is not the enemy of culture or sovereignty.

The gap is not talent. Indigenous communities hold deep ecological knowledge and food system expertise. Rural communities are rich in ingenuity and agricultural skill. The problem is structural.

Infrastructure gaps limit access to markets. Capital remains uneven and inaccessible, particularly for Indigenous entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship education and mentorship are still overwhelmingly urban-focused. Regulatory systems often don’t fit small-scale or Indigenous food enterprises. And long-standing inequities continue to undermine economic sovereignty and risk-taking.

If Canada wants a truly competitive and sustainable agri-food sector, urban and southern innovation alone won’t get us there.

The future lies in unlocking entrepreneurial power in northern, rural, and Indigenous communities—the very communities that steward the land, protect biodiversity, and hold knowledge critical to climate resilience.

It’s time to treat entrepreneurship as essential agri-food infrastructure, not an afterthought.

That means investing in rural and northern infrastructure, redesigning capital tools, modernizing regulations, and building entrepreneurship education and mentorship that is locally grounded and culturally relevant.

If you fund agri-food, shape policy, work in economic development, or lead institutions: ask who is still being left out—and change that.

Canada’s agri-food future depends on it.