Canada should push for sustainability and more open trade.Ottawa—Canada needs a program to sustainably increase agriculture production for a growing global population while tackling international obstacles to food exports, says John Weekes, a veteran trade negotiator.Climate change is exacting an increasing toll on food production around the world and the government “should establish a strategic plan for putting Canadian agriculture in the lead in addressing this challenge,” said Weekes, a member of the Board of the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute.“There is considerable scope for Canadian producers to increase production in an environmentally sustainable way. But doing so will require adjustments to the legal framework, including in the international trade rules.”Agriculture could be a key sector for growth in Canada's post COVID recovery if foreign obstacles to it can be overcome, he said. Canada is the only G7 member that is a net food exporter. “This makes it hard to seek a new consensus on reforming the agricultural trade rules with our traditional partners.”An alternate approach would to “reach out strategically to other food-exporting countries to explore with them how to negotiate effectively to establish rules that will allow these countries to get fair and stable returns for their agricultural products.“It is critical to ensure that the international trade rules promote the right price signals to encourage the production of food in an environmentally sustainable way,” Weekes said. “This is not an impossible dream, but it will require political leadership, a lot of hard technical work, and explaining to other countries why the approach is necessary to feeding the world in a sustainable way.”There very few other countries that are net exporters of agricultural products including Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Brazil, Australia and New Zealand. The EU and the U.S. are major exporters but also major food importers and cannot solve the global food shortage on their own, he said.Another issue for Canada is getting effective access to foreign markets for its food products once a trade deal has been reached. “Canada has an impressive array of free trade agreements, but exporters complain that in many markets various barriers continue to frustrate our exports.”More damaging to Canadian producers are the large production distorting subsidies such as the U.S., the EU, China and India. “Canada's future trade agenda should address these concerns that are shared by other net food exporters.”Borrowing on the successful example of the Cairns Group in improving agricultural trade, Canada “could take the lead in creating a new group dedicated to the twin objectives of removing remaining impediments to agricultural trade and ensuring that efforts to feed the world are done in an environmentally sustainable way.”“In the post COVID world it is becoming increasingly obvious that the biggest global challenges will require international cooperation,” Weekes said. “By taking the initiative now Canada can play a leading role in establishing the basis for success.”