In Montreal, where nearly half of all food never reaches a table, a team of researchers has secured $6.5 million in federal funding to ask an ancient question with modern tools: what if the microorganisms that have always broken down organic matter could be understood well enough to do it better? At a moment when Canadian agriculture and food waste collectively outpace passenger vehicles as a source of carbon emissions, this project places genomic science in service of a circular economy — not by inventing new life, but by listening more carefully to the life already at work.
Canadian researchers secure $6.5M to use genomics reducing agri-food carbon emissions
Waste will be transformed into food or fertilizers
Mark
Why does Montreal matter so much for this project? There are cities everywhere.
Mimi
Montreal has the density and diversity of food waste you need. A dozen breweries, 150 bakeries, vineyards, restaurants—all producing different kinds of organic byproducts in one place. You can't study this in a lab. You need real waste streams from real businesses.
Mark
So they're not building something new. They're optimizing what already exists.
Mimi
Exactly. Mushroom farms and insect operations already exist. Urban farmers are already running them. The researchers are asking: what if we could understand the microbiology inside these systems well enough to make them faster, cleaner, more efficient?
Mark
How does genomics help with that?
Mimi
Genomics lets you see which microorganisms are actually doing the work, how they interact with each other, which ones produce greenhouse gases and which ones don't. Once you see that, you can optimize conditions—temperature, moisture, food sources—to favor the organisms you want and suppress the ones you don't.
Mark
And the end product is what? Fertilizer?
Mimi
Fertilizer, or food for animals, or in some cases food for humans. The point is the waste doesn't go to a landfill. It gets cycled back into the food system or the agricultural system. That's the circular economy part.
Mark
The numbers in the announcement are striking. 161,000 tonnes of CO2 avoided in Quebec alone.
Mimi
That's if they can scale it. Right now it's a proof of concept. But yes—if even 20 percent of Quebec's organic waste went through these systems instead of landfills, the carbon reduction would be significant. And that's just one province.
Mark
What's the risk? What could go wrong?
Mimi
Scaling is always the hard part. A successful lab or a successful pilot in Montreal doesn't automatically work in Toronto or Calgary. You need the right partners, the right waste streams, the right regulatory environment. But the fact that they've assembled thirty community partners already suggests they're thinking about that.
Il Polso
- Canada's agri-food sector quietly surpasses all passenger vehicles combined in annual CO2 output, making the urgency of intervention far greater than most citizens realize.
- In Quebec alone, 41 percent of food never reaches a plate — a staggering volume of organic waste rotting in landfills and releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
- Researchers Joan Laur and Louise Hénault-Ethier are deploying DNA sequencing and genomic analysis to decode the microbial activity inside mushroom farms and insect operations, seeking to accelerate and clean up nature's own decomposition processes.
- Montreal's dense network of microbreweries, bakeries, and urban farms gives the team over thirty real-world partners and a living city as their laboratory — far beyond controlled academic conditions.
- If successful, the model could divert enough organic waste to prevent over 161,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually in Quebec and lock an additional 202,000 tonnes of carbon into agricultural soils as fertilizer.
In Montreal, where nearly half of all food never reaches a table, a team of researchers has secured $6.5 million in federal funding to ask an ancient question with modern tools: what if the microorganisms that have always broken down organic matter could be understood well enough to do it better? At a moment when Canadian agriculture and food waste collectively outpace passenger vehicles as a source of carbon emissions, this project places genomic science in service of a circular economy — not by inventing new life, but by listening more carefully to the life already at work.
Montreal is about to become a laboratory for turning waste into a resource. A Canadian research team led by Joan Laur of Université de Montréal and Louise Hénault-Ethier of the Institut national de la recherche scientifique has secured $6.5 million in federal funding to transform the organic byproducts of the city's bakeries, breweries, and restaurants into food or fertilizer — rather than letting them decompose in landfills and release greenhouse gases.
The scale of the problem gives the project its urgency. In Canada, agriculture and food waste together generate more carbon dioxide annually than all passenger vehicles on the road. In Quebec alone, 41 percent of food never reaches a plate. The researchers believe the solution lies not in new invention but in better understanding what nature has always done: the way microorganisms, fungi, and insects break down organic matter. Using genomic tools — DNA sequencing and genetic analysis — they aim to map the microbial ecosystems inside existing bioreactors like mushroom and insect farms, identifying which organisms work most efficiently and how to optimize conditions for lower emissions and greater usable output.
Montreal offers an ideal testing ground. The city is surrounded by nearly 500 square kilometers of food production activity, and the research team — roughly twenty scientists from four universities including McGill and Western — will collaborate with more than thirty community partners: composting operations, insect farms, breweries, and environmental nonprofits. This is not a controlled experiment; it is science embedded in a living city with real waste streams and real businesses.
The projected impact is significant. Shifting just 20 percent of Quebec's organic waste toward decentralized composting, mushroom farming, and insect farming could prevent 161,381 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually — a 27 percent reduction in that waste stream — while locking an additional 202,000 tonnes of carbon into agricultural soils. Nationally, the nine teams funded through Genome Canada's Climate Action Genomics Initiative are expected to generate over 36,000 jobs as these innovations move from research into practice. If the model proves replicable, it could reshape how cities across Canada — and beyond — think about food, waste, and the possibility of a genuinely closed loop.
Montreal is about to become a laboratory for turning garbage into gold. A team of Canadian researchers has just secured $6.5 million in federal funding to figure out how to take the organic waste that flows through the city's bakeries, breweries, and restaurants—and transform it into food or fertilizer instead of letting it rot in landfills and release greenhouse gases into the air.
The scale of the problem is staggering. In Canada, agriculture and food waste together produce more carbon dioxide in a single year than all the cars on the road. In Quebec alone, 41 percent of food never reaches a plate. The researchers leading this project—Joan Laur from Université de Montréal and Louise Hénault-Ethier from the Institut national de la recherche scientifique—believe the answer lies not in inventing something new, but in understanding and optimizing something nature has been doing for millions of years: the way microorganisms, fungi, and insects break down organic matter.
The approach is deceptively simple. Urban farmers already run mushroom farms and insect operations that consume food scraps and other agricultural byproducts. What Laur, Hénault-Ethier, and their colleagues want to do is use genomic tools—the machinery of genetic analysis and DNA sequencing—to study exactly which microorganisms are doing the work, how efficiently they're doing it, and how to make the process faster and cleaner. By understanding the microbial conversations happening inside these bioreactors, they can optimize them to produce less greenhouse gas while generating more usable output.
Montreal is the perfect place to test this. The city sits atop nearly 500 square kilometers of food production: a dozen microbreweries, close to 150 bakeries, vineyards, and countless other sources of organic waste scattered throughout neighborhoods. The research team—about twenty scientists from four universities, including Western University and McGill—will work directly with more than thirty community partners: composting operations, insect farming companies, breweries, bakeries, and nonprofits like the David Suzuki Foundation and Équiterre. This is not a lab experiment. It is a real city, with real waste streams, and real businesses trying to figure out how to operate more sustainably.
The potential impact is substantial. If Quebec were to shift just 20 percent of its organic waste toward decentralized composting, mushroom farming, and insect farming, the province could avoid 161,381 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually—a 27 percent reduction in that waste stream alone. An additional 202,000 tonnes of carbon could be locked into agricultural soils as fertilizer. Across Canada, the nine teams selected for this round of federal funding are expected to create over 36,000 jobs as these biotechnological innovations move from research into practice.
The funding is part of a larger federal initiative called Genome Canada's Climate Action Genomics Initiative, which distributed nearly $70 million across nine interdisciplinary teams nationwide. The announcement came from Greg Fergus, parliamentary secretary to the Prime Minister, speaking at Quebec's largest urban agriculture cooperative. The message from Ottawa was clear: genomics is not just about medicine or ancestry testing anymore. It is a tool for building resilience in food systems, for creating jobs, and for reducing the carbon footprint of one of Canada's most essential industries.
What happens next depends on the research. The team will spend the coming years mapping the microbial ecosystems inside these bioreactors, identifying which organisms are most efficient at breaking down different types of waste, and testing whether they can engineer conditions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions before, during, and after the biodegradation process. If they succeed, the model could be replicated in cities across Canada and beyond—turning waste into a resource, and food production into something closer to a closed loop.
Citazioni salienti
We can really reduce the carbon footprint of the agri-food system by creating a circular economy inspired by the natural functioning of ecosystems, and optimize these applications using the power of genomics.— Louise Hénault-Ethier, co-investigator and associate professor at INRS
This teamwork between entrepreneurs, structuring organizations, and the research community is an incredible driver of innovation.— Louise Hénault-Ethier
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Climate & Environment