Our Story
How We Got Here
The vision for CASI began in 2017 as an Ontario project called the Sustainable Farm & Food Initiative (SFFI). It was designed to explore the concept of a system that will simplify the process of meeting sustainability requirements. The goal of SFFI was to develop a framework that would facilitate communication and reporting across various commodity-specific programs. In creating a “whole farm” approach based on a common set of practices, SFFI allowed for sustainability actions to be implemented on farms and be recognized throughout the value chain. The Ontario project confirmed the desire and viability for a similar national approach and resulted in the CFA applying for funding through the AgriAssurance program of the Canadian Agricultural Partnership.
The First Proof-of-Concept: Ontario’s Dairy Goat Sector Pilot
A coalition of Ontario farm and food organizations and ten Ontario dairy goat producers worked together to undertake a proof-of-concept of the Sustainable Farm and Food Initiative concept. The sector operates within a global agri-food system and evidence of a commitment to sustainability outcomes is an increasingly common expectation. In fact, there are already numerous sustainability programs in various stages of implementation throughout the global agri-food value chain, ranging from voluntary programs to more intensely scrutinized standards and codes that require third-party audits and certification.
Using a whole value chain approach to this project, OMAFRA industry experts, dairy goat producers and processors collaborated to test the viability for a whole-farm sustainability platform. Using a grassroots approach, consultants visited ten dairy goat farms across Ontario to test the viability of the Sustainable Farm and Food Initiative concept. Through this work, the demand and feasibility of a 'made-in-Canada' sustainability platform was confirmed.
Learn more about the CASI project
View the Q&A session, below. Or check out the Frequently Asked page, here.