Canada is looking to increase pulse sales to India by working in areas of mutual need.
Nutritional security is very important to India and part of its plan is to build food processing capacity in the world's most populous country.
More pulse processing in India will in theory lead to increased pulse crop purchases from Canada.
"This becomes less a matter of tariffs and quotas and pure access, and it becomes a matter of what is in our collective best interest, what are you trying to achieve, and how is it that we can support that?" said Greg Cherewyk, CEO of Pulse Canada who was a recent guest on the Saskatchewan Pulse Growers podcast called "Pulse of the Prairies".
"In the case of nutritional security, this is about ensuring that the diet in India transitions from one that's more carb-rich to more protein-rich. In particular, for those that are vegetarian or consuming more plant-based foods, there's a need to ensure that there's adequate protein in that diet, and of course, pulses are central to that movement." he added.
Cherewyk sees great potential for additional pulse use in school meals.
"How we can work together to ensure that meals that are included in schools, through the school meal programming initiatives, also include more pulse ingredients. So whether that's snacks or meals, again, positioning pulses as a core and central ingredient so that we can boost the nutrient density of these meals served to children each and every day." he said.
"And over the course of the year, you're talking about 100 million meals, so it's a very significant program. It's a great opportunity for us to do something together that has a really positive public good outcome as well."
As part of the nutrition security file, Canada and India announced the Canada-India Pulse Protein Centre of Excellence in early March.
"The Protein Centre of Excellence, you know, is going to knit together this whole ecosystem of professionals that exists in India and across Canada. So you have academics, you have industry players, you have government officials that have an interest in pursuing these common objectives of nutritional security and enhanced food processing, and in particular, food processing that includes pulse ingredients." Cherewyk said.
Cherewyk calls Canada and India the world's two "pulse super powers".
You can hear more on this topic on the most recent Saskatchewan Pulse Growers podcast — Pulse of the Prairies.
(With files from Neil Billinger, CJWW)
