Companies should tap a specific market, rather than focus on a generalization of producing safe food, says Michael McCain
OTTAWA — Michael McCain promised in his opening remarks that his speech would be provocative.
He didn’t disappoint.
The chief executive officer of Maple Leaf Foods told a forum on Canada’s Agri-Food Future in early November that it would be a mistake for Canada to try to become the country with the most trusted food system in the world.
“The one word I would describe this (plan), in our view, is dangerous,” he said.
“(It’s) something we should not attempt.”
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McCain’s comments caught many off guard at the conference, which was hosted by the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute and Canada 2020.
He said Canada already has a strong reputation for safe food. It would be fruitless to brand the nation’s agri-food sector as most trusted because the food market is complicated and segmented.
“We can only afford in our industry to add value where individual customers or markets … will pay for that value, and not everybody will,” McCain said.
“That cost, in our view, will never be universally valued because of a marketplace that isn’t homogenous…. We believe that innovation and adding value is the domain of individual participants.”
In other words, companies should pursue a specific market segment, whether it be organic, natural or consumers who want enhanced animal welfare, but a country shouldn’t have an over-arching brand.
“Canada isn’t large enough or influential enough or competitive enough as an industry … to try and establish and paint one brush across the whole industry, saying we’re going to compete on a different plane.”
As an example, players in the global meat industry compete on taste, packaging and convenience. Some companies differentiate their products based on socially responsible practices such as animal welfare and sustainability.
However, McCain said meat processors do not compete on food safety because the entire industry benefits from safe food.
“We’ve explicitly defined food safety as a non-competitive issue amongst the players in North America.”
David Piggott of Morrison Lamothe, a frozen food manufacturer near Toronto, agreed.
He said his company already produces safe food, and dedicating more time and resources to enhance food safety would provide minimal rewards.
“It’s not enough to sell food safety,” he said.
“We have to sell on competitive basis and trust means different things in different markets.”
Rene Van Acker, a University of Guelph plant agriculture professor, also said McCain is correct because it’s difficult to have a “one size fits all” approach for an industry that contributes more than $100 billion to Canada’s gross domestic product.
CAPI president David McInnes said the conference’s theme about whether Canada should develop a “most trusted food system” wasn’t a prescription for the country’s agri-food sector. The objective was to provoke a discussion on ways to differentiate Canadian food.
“A theme that has been repeated frequently here is that Canada is blessed with opportunity…. How can we use trust to make greater connections across the supply chain?” he said. “(Maybe) how we manage our ecological capital, our water and our quality soil, to the nutritional value of food…. The question is, how do we connect that and make this into a strategic dialogue for Canada?”
Cargill senior vice-president Bill Buckner agreed that Canada is well positioned to differentiate its food products. Developing a Canadian brand will take money and a committed effort, but it’s not an all-in bet.
Buckner said Canada’s agri-food sector can tailor its products and messages to more than one segment of the marketplace.
“From my world it’s not an either/or. It’s an and,” he said.
“You’re not going to be all one thing. There are different consumers…. You can serve more than one (type of) consumer.”
