Is food on the climate policy table? Assessing food systems themes in Canadian municipal climate plans

Bernard Soubry (), Kerstin Schreiber () and Graham K. MacDonald ()
Additional contact information
Bernard Soubry: McGill University
Kerstin Schreiber: McGill University
Graham K. MacDonald: McGill University

Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 2025, vol. 30, issue 5, No 13, 25 pages

Abstract: Abstract Cities have emerged as essential players in climate mitigation and community adaptation to climate change impacts. Food and agriculture are particularly climate-vulnerable sectors, but the degree to which these are considered in climate action plans for municipalities in the Global North is unclear. We reviewed climate plans for 25 major Canadian cities to examine how they discussed climate action opportunities around food systems circa the years 2021–2022. Our qualitative content analysis highlighted four overarching contexts of discussion: (1) general climate and food systems linkages; (2) aspirational framings or desired outcomes for food systems; (3) rural and urban food production; and (4) food distribution and consumption. We compared the results of our thematic analysis to a set of established climate change ‘response options’ for the food system from two high-level synthesis frameworks, including land management, supply chain management, risk management, and food systems transformation. Our findings suggest that food and agriculture are often discussed in superficial ways in these municipal climate plans, frequently lacking clear definitions of concepts or proposing solutions to address climate impacts on food systems that are not realistically under municipal control (e.g., rural land management). Response options more clearly within municipal jurisdiction (e.g., food procurement) are often discussed in vague terms or overlooked altogether. Future municipal climate plans should therefore focus on building rural–urban linkages into planning around agriculture, linking climate impacts to policy planning, and harnessing the power of supply chains for food systems transformation. Without identifying solutions to address stated impacts, cities risk a form of “climate taming” that could impede transformation.

Keywords: Urban governance; Climate adaptation; Urban sustainability; Climate resilience; Municipal planning; Food governance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11027-025-10224-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:30:y:2025:i:5:d:10.1007_s11027-025-10224-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11027

DOI: 10.1007/s11027-025-10224-x

Access Statistics for this article

Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change is currently edited by Robert Dixon

More articles in Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().