Ottawa is touting a $3.2-billion food strategy without clearly revealing how the money will be spent or what taxpayers will ultimately pay

You have to give Ottawa credit for creativity.

In Budget 2025, last year, it introduced a framework that separates day-to-day operating spending from capital investment. In Budget 2026, Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne can point to a projected $11.2-billion operating surplus in 2027–28. In that very same year, Ottawa projects an overall deficit of $62.5 billion. Both figures come from the same budget. When Canadians hear that Ottawa is on track to balance its books, they deserve to hear both numbers.

There is an economic case for drawing the distinction. A school kitchen can serve children for decades. The groceries and staff needed to prepare lunch are recurring expenses. A food bank needs money for groceries every week, while a walk-in freezer can expand how much food it can store and distribute for years. Ottawa’s framework generally treats grants as capital when the recipient is required to build, buy or improve an asset. The funding terms matter.

On the farm, the distinctions get more interesting. Ottawa has made up to $1.2 billion available to dairy farmers as compensation for concessions under the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement. The payments are based on milk quota and carry no requirement to buy equipment, so they fit the operating side of the framework. A contribution tied to installing an automated processing line fits the capital side. The Parliamentary Budget Officer found a similar split in climate policy. Ottawa counts Agricultural Climate Solutions as operating spending and Agricultural Clean Technology as capital, even though both help farms reduce emissions.

Then there’s the $3.2-billion National Food Security Strategy. Building regional food terminals can give independent grocers more options for sourcing and distributing food. Helping a provincially licensed processor meet federal requirements can open markets across provincial borders. The first can qualify as capital. The second, when it pays for regulatory or technical assistance, would generally be operating spending. Both can make Canada’s food supply chain more competitive.

Budget 2026 puts an asterisk beside the strategy and the $124-million renewal of the Local Food Infrastructure Fund to indicate that they contain capital investment. The chapter’s fiscal table gives a capital total for the chapter as a whole. It leaves readers guessing how much of either measure counts as capital. The strategy also includes $1 billion in Farm Credit Canada financing. A billion dollars in financing and a billion dollars in grants can have very different costs for taxpayers. Ottawa should publish the operating and capital breakdown for each program, along with the expected federal cost of the financing.

The same standard should apply when we talk about farm support abroad. Canadians are quick to scrutinize the U.S. Farm Bill for how it shapes production and competition. We should bring that scrutiny home. Canada supports dairy through direct payments and through supply management, which uses production quotas, administered pricing and import controls. Some over-quota tariffs on dairy products exceed 300 per cent. The United States and New Zealand have both formally challenged how Canada administers its dairy import quotas. Those disputes were about market access, and they show how closely our trading partners already examine the support and protection we give the sector.

Canada needs investment in food processing, distribution and year-round production. If Ottawa wants credit for those investments, it should show Canadians what each measure buys, what it costs and how it affects the overall deficit. An asterisk is a poor substitute for a dollar figure.

Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is senior director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University, co-host of The Food Professor Podcast and visiting scholar at McGill University.