Amid the patriotic efforts that hit the chest and the sincere efforts of the Canadians to do the right thing with their country in front of the US tariffs on the other hand, the humble small arce leaf has been working overtime.
Perhaps anywhere more than in the grocery store, where the shelves are stamped with red maple leaves to indicate that certain products are, to some extent, Canadians.
But does it mean what buyers think what it means? Why do some Canadian products have an ARCE leaf sticker or a shelf platform, while others do not?
A visit to a Halifax Sobeys and Superstore found a somewhat random and disconcerting use of the indicators.
For example, some Canadian toaders of coffee beans, such as Kicking Horse Coffee, based on BC, had a Arce leaf sticker on the shelf in One Sobeys, while the Jumping Bean Bean Coffee coffee, did not.
Tim Hortons coffee beans, owned by a Brazilian investment firm, did not have the sticker in Sobeys, but had a speaker of shelf in the Superstore who said he was “prepared in Canada.” The packages themselves had a prominent arce sheet in the front, with text underneath that it said “roasted in Canada since 1964.”
Some products that probably know the locals to be produced in Nueva Scotia, such as Farmers Milk, Oxford Blueberries and Cosman and Whidden Honey did not have the sticker in One Sobeys, although some had the brand for Nueva Scotia Loyal. New Scotia Loyal is a provincial program that labels as manufactured locally.
Just Us Coffee, based in Nueva Scotia, had coffee beans with the Loyal brand of Nueva Scotia and the Arce leaf sticker on the shelf.
Arce’s syrup hall was equally confusing. Only a Arce syrup product in Sobeys, the internal brand of the store, our compliments, received the treatment with Arce leaf shelf, while several other Canadian brands did not do so.
Anna and Chris Hutchinson have been producing Arce syrup on their farm south of Berwick, NS, for more than a decade, selling locally and exporting to the Middle East, the Netherlands and Costa Rica.
Anna Hutchinson leads her products to all Sebeys stores in the province and stores the shelves.
She has noticed that some stores have the Arce leaf sticker on the shelves with her syrup, while others do not. She says that using the stickers is at the discretion of the store manager, but if some are missing with their product, it is likely that it is just a human error.
“I think it’s just personal,” he said. “They simply don’t have enough staff to take care of things.”
And, granted, grocery stores carry thousands of products. It would be difficult to successfully label everything correctly.
But Hutchinson said he wants his products to have the shelf sticker because he sees that makes a difference in what customers buy. He adds that while their products have the loyal brand of New Scotland, “it is not remarkable enough.”
As a consumer, Hutchinson questions how the store decides when to use the arce leaf shelf sticker.
“They are everywhere. Ninety percent of the product seems to have one of those.
The CBC requested an interview with Sobeys, but the company did not respond.
A Loblaw spokesman rejected an interview and provided a statement that did not answer the CBC question about how the company decides which products get the speaker of “prepared in Canada” shelf.
The statement says that Loblaw is showing products that are prepared in Canada in their stores, online and in flyers in the hope that you will facilitate purchasing decisions. The company is also ensuring as much food as possible or made in Canada, and looks for more products of this type, according to the statement.
The small print
In Sobeys, a Canadian company, almost the entire internal brand our fulfilled products had the maple leaf sticker, even if the product itself was “imported for” sovereys, as a grated coconut, or “prepared for” sovereys, as orange juice.
Mike Von Massow, a professor at the University of Guelph who studies food and labeling, says that food producers and retailers should explain what their labeling really means.
“I think supermarkets should be a bit careful. They need to be simple when saying what it means and why they are putting those labels there.
“As long as we are clear about what they tell us, I don’t think something bad is necessarily, but in some cases it could be excessive simplification,” he said. “There is the risk of, you know, to coin a new phrase, wash the Arce to try to get more credit for being Canadian than a client might expect.”
The language on labels leaves a lot of space for conjectures about how a Canadian article is really, with terms such as “made in Canada of imported and national ingredients”, “manufactured by/for” and “imported”.
Canada has many rules about food labeling, but most consumers have not taken the time to visit the website of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to decipher everything.
Von Massow says that if buying Canadian is important for consumers, they must read tags and ask questions.
“Obviously there is room for deception here. But if you ask, if you pay attention, you can make your decision based on that mature midpoint.”
