b'RETAIL STRATEGYTHE REAL TOOLS BEHIND CANADASAGRI-FOOD INFLUENCETrade diplomacy, regulatory agility, and trust-based partnerships are making us a magnet for global capital and collaboration.Marc ZienkiewiczIN TODAYS GLOBAL trade environment,tariff uncertainty, Canadas cereals sector the seed and cereal industries are beinghas leaned into the things it can control: reshapednot by chance, but byresearch partnerships, resilient breeding design. Strategic partnerships are theprograms, and long-term investment in engine behind that transformation. Andtrust and quality.as our recent Retail Strategy webinarReid emphasizes that while cereals showed, Canadas agri-food leaders areare more insulated from certain trade not just keeping pace with change shocks than, say, canola, the risk land-theyre helping define it. scape still looms large. Everyone, like Jeff Reid serves asLeif Carlson isThe webinar brought together keyit or not, is facing uncertainty, he said. general manager fordirector, marketvoices from across the industry toThat affects how we invest. But cereals SeCan. intelligence and trade policy at Cerealsunpack how collaborationfrom farmhave held strong, in part because of the Canada. gate to export marketis drivingdiverse export markets weve cultivated growth, resilience, and innovation inand the public-private partnerships that Canadian agriculture. From viral maplesupport our breeding pipelines.syrup videos to hard-hitting trade policy updates from Washington, the conver- Resilience by Designsation underscored one key message:For Reid, the real story is long-term Canadas seed and cereal sectors areresilience. What we invest in today stronger when they work together. impacts us 10 or 15 years from now, he Heres what we learned. says. And in cereals, Canada has had a really solid run. Certified seed use is up. Made in Canadaand Made to Compete Wheat productivity is outpacing expec-Jeff Reid, general manager for SeCan,tations. And instead of being flooded by knows just how deeply rooted CanadianU.S. genetics, in many instances were Kody Blois is parliamentary secretary to Primepride runs at his organization. Reidthe ones supplying the U.S. with elite Minister Mark Carney. was the star of a YouTube video SeCanmaterial.produced during the recent tariff crisisThats no accident. Reid credits the in which he talked about SeCansstrength of Canadian institutionsCanadian values, shot on location atfrom Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Reids personal maple syrup shack in(AAFC) to the Crop Development rural Ontario. Centre to universities across the Prairies It was really just a fun video shot for fostering not just good science, in my sugar bush, he said. But it hitbut good collaboration. Weve built a nerve. Because the message is true systems of resilience, he says. And now this work we do in the seed industry isits time to double down.uniquely Canadian, and were proud ofBut he also cautioned against com-Michael Harvey isLauren Comin isthat. placency. We cant afford to erode the executive directordirector of policy for for the CanadianSeeds Canada. As global trade dynamics shift andinfrastructure we depend onespe-Agri-Food Tradepressures mount from geopoliticalcially not in public breeding. AAFC, Association (CAFTA). instability, supply chain constraints, andfor instance, is still a powerhouse, but if 34 SEEDWORLD.COM/CANADA JULY 2025'