Farmscape for May 15, 2024

The Executive Director of Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan reports visits to CanadianFoodFocus.org are now peaking at over one million per month.
CanadianFoodFocus.org was launched by Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan in 2019 in an effort to reach more Canadian consumers and is highlighted as part of Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan's May eNewsletter.
Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan Executive Director Clinton Monchuk says we do a great job in the agriculture industry of talking to ourselves, other farmers, people in agribusiness but we really need to talk to the individuals in cities, like Vancouver and Montreal and give them an opportunity to engage with food and get a better understanding of food production.

Quote-Clinton Monchuk-Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan:
Really what we're trying to bring into CanadianFoodFocus is those who have a genuine interest in food.
A lot of the market research that we've done throughout the country indicates that people really do have questions about their food so we want to create an avenue where people can go to get transparent, truthful information about how their food is grown, different nutritional facts, how to use your food.
We actually have seven sections, all the way from what to do in your kitchen, nutritional facts, farm stories but we also have actually a learn to cook.
We started this a little bit into the COVID years and found that it had a huge pickup.
People truly wanted to learn how to cook better for their families.
We're trying to create content that people genuinely have interest in.
But the kicker for the agriculture industry is there's always a lead to how that food is being produced.
For example, if somebody is interested in how to cook a pork roast, they can find out on the website but then it also leads to, how is that pork actually produced here in this country?
It really is a great learning opportunity and we want to make sure that Canadians are engaged with their food.

Monchuk says when the site was launched it was felt the effort would be considered successful if it could reach another 100 thousand people per month.
He notes last year's stats from the website and social media channels show engagement of just over 800 thousand individuals per month, sometimes surpassing a million and its growing.
For more visit Farmscape.Ca.
Bruce Cochrane.

       *Farmscape is produced on behalf of North America’s pork producers