Harriet Friedmann, Professor Emerita, University of Toronto
I am a food system analyst, writer and lecturer. Since retiring from the University of Toronto in 2012, I freely pollinate the worlds of academia, policy, and activism across scales of organization. I first entered the unnamed realm that became “agro-food systems” in the 1970s by studying the historical emergence of a world wheat market. I was also lucky to be connected with the early emergence of the pioneering Toronto Food Policy Council and its eventual embrace of city-regional food systems. These connections happily converged with two emergent phenomena: the interdisciplinary intellectual field of food studies. My main passions now are seed biodiversity, city food regions, commons, resilience theory, and exploring with others the present possibilities for food system transformations in a world-ecological context— what might be called emergent modes of foodgetting.

https://harrietfriedmann.ca/new-page-1 

Rod McRae - Professor Emeritus, York University
Rod McRae is a food policy analyst with over 35 years of experience examining the transition to a sustainable and health-promoting food system for Canada. Following doctoral studies at McGill University, he co-ordinated the Toronto Food Policy Council for 10 years, then worked for 10 years as a consultant to governments, businesses and NGOs on projects to advance sustainable food systems in Canada. Before his retirement, Rod was an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change at York University, where his research focused on developing a national food policy for Canada and the coherent, comprehensive programs required to support it.

https://euc.yorku.ca/faculty/roderick-j-macrae/ 
https://www.aic.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/RodMacRaeBio.pdf 

Guest Host:

Kaleigh McIntosh - PhD Candidate, Carleton University
I’m a PhD candidate in Geography and Environmental Studies at Carleton University, where my research focuses on how collaboration between different groups shapes long-term resilience in complex socioecological systems. My current work looks at the Wolastoq Valley in New Brunswick, where I study how relationships among diverse stakeholders influence watershed governance and resilience efforts over time.

Before this, I completed a BA in Political Science at Carleton and a Master’s in Development Studies at York University. My MA research took me to South Tarawa, Kiribati, where I explored community-based climate adaptation and how local organizations contribute to broader climate and disaster risk reduction efforts.

Across my work, I’m particularly interested in questions of inclusion—who gets to participate in climate adaptation and governance, who doesn’t, and what that means for social and environmental justice in complex systems.