What produce does Canada import? How the US, Mexico and other countries supply the Canadian market

By Sachi Wickramasinghe

Find out where your fruits and vegetables come from and what’s grown locally in Canada and BC with this interactive map

Recently, several of Canada’s first ministers have encouraged people to buy Canadian products at the grocery store to counter potential US tariffs. But just how much do we rely on imported fruits and vegetables, particularly from the US? 
 
Canada Food Flows, an interactive website developed by UBC researchers, maps the flow of 34 popular fruits and vegetables into and across Canadian provinces over 13 years and reveals how interconnected international and inter-provincial food systems are.
 
“Many fruits and vegetables are harder to grow in the colder Canadian climate. On average, about 50 per cent of vegetables besides potatoes, and 75 per cent of fruits eaten in Canada, are imported,” said Dr. Kushank Bajaj. “Those are significant numbers.”

Dr. Bajaj is a former UBC postdoctoral research fellow at UBC’s Institute for Resource, Environment and Sustainability (IRES} and School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA). “We hope Canada Food Flows can help Canadians understand where their produce comes from, and spark conversations about how things like climate change and trade policy could impact supply in the future,” he says.

Dr. Bajaj created the tool with Dr. Navin Ramankutty, Canada Research Chair in Data Science for Sustainable Global Food Systems at UBC, who is also a professor at IRES and SSPGA. Eating locally can support sustainability and regional growers, says Dr. Ramankutty. But the reality is we’re all interconnected. “Canada is also a major supplier of produce like blueberries, mushrooms and greenhouse vegetables to the US,” he says. “This two-way dependency underscores how tariffs or adverse climate events could impact food security and economies in both countries.”

Where do Canada’s fruit and vegetables come from? 

To create the dataset that powers Canada Food Flows, Dr. Bajaj combined data on production, imports and exports to estimate how 18 fruits and 16 vegetables were consumed and shared between 2010 and 2022. 

The result is an interactive map showing how produce flows from US states and 149 other countries, as well as between Canadian provinces.

The website also shows how interprovincial trade plays a key role, enabling provinces like Ontario and BC to balance regional agricultural production and supply fresh produce to other parts of the country.

You can explore Canada Food Flows to see how:

• US states supply 67 percent of Canada’s vegetable imports and 36 percent of Canada’s fruit imports
• 81 per cent of BC’s spinach, 70 per cent of BC’s lettuce, and 75 per cent of BC’s onions came from the US in 2022
• 97 per cent of BC’s avocados were imported from Mexico in 2022
• 92 percent of BC’s strawberries were imported from the US and Mexico in 2022

Learn more about how we can make our food systems more sustainable

Sachi Wickramasinghe is a writer with UBC Media Relations. This article was adapted from the original article from UBC Media Relations and published on February 6, 2025. Read the original article here. To republish the original article, please contact UBC Media Relations.