How a trade war could boost small-scale farming in southwestern Ontario

A southwestern Ontario farmer hopes the ongoing U.S.-Canada trade war encourages the country to look inward to keep itself fed, while making itself more resilient in the face of future crises.

It's a hope shared by some farmers with smaller operations, as they search for upsides in a situation that could have dire consequences for the Canadian economy — and agribusiness on a larger scale.

"I think it's really important that we know how to supply ourselves," said Chris DeVries, the owner of Common Ground Farm in St. Thomas, who believes "we could 100 per cent produce all the food we need."

The former engineer grows a wide range of vegetables year-round in a combination of fields, greenhouses and hoop houses, taking his harvest to farmers' markets in London and Kitchener. Common Ground also runs a delivery service in London and St. Thomas.

A number of industries across Canada have already started cutting back as tariff threats from U.S. President Donald Trump — and a resulting lack of certainty — loom.

Although the agricultural sector, which exported roughly $40 billion in products to the U.S. in 2023, isn't immune to those effects, it continues to push forward to keep people fed. U.S. tariffs are expected to give a devastating blow to southwestern Ontario's greenhouse growing industry along with farming. 

For DeVries, little has changed recently.

"It's only really viable for me to sell to local customers," he said. "Otherwise I'd have to be far bigger."

With that, he expects to see growing interest in Canadian produce, and moving forward hopes to see more of the sector shift toward producing with the domestic market in mind.

"The system we have has meant that it's often more efficient for us to grow [and export] cash crops like corn and soybeans here, and for us to get our produce from somewhere else," DeVries said. "But I think this might be a time where we consider, well, is that always the right answer?"

One challenge DeVries acknowledges is that certain products can't be feasibly grown year-round, or at all, in Canada.

"We've become used to having everything we want whenever we want. Eating seasonally is a little different than eating whatever is available whenever," he said.

Larger producers set to suffer most

According to Ethan Wallace, a vice president with the Ontario Federation of Agriculture (OFA), the idea of a trade war helping small-scale farmers has merit.

"The farm to table marketers, the farmers with the roadside stands, the small and medium-sized producers that the market direct to consumer, are the ones that stand to gain the most out of out of all of this," Wallace said. "As consumers decide to buy local, they're looking for those people."

The hope for the industry as a whole, Wallace said, is that those consumers also prioritize looking for Canadian labels in grocery stores.

That's because while smaller operations can benefit from the broadening of their customer base, larger farms that have specialized in products that are often exported won't be so lucky.

Wallace, who farms dairy cows just outside of Seaforth, points to hog farmers, who export roughly 25,000 pigs south of the border each week. He said they, like many other farmers, have purpose-built farms that can't be adjusted to produce other commodities without significant investment.

With that in mind, he said, larger operations across the country will increasingly rely on the "Buy Canadian" mindset that has swept the nation to get by since the demand for their products stateside will diminish.

They'll also have to hope they can make up for some lost exports by shipping products elsewhere.

"The silver lining for the large commercial operator may be our government and our trade teams looking beyond the U.S. to other countries that need our products, and looking to supply other jurisdictions with high quality Canadian product," Wallace said.