Ten Food Predictions for 2025

1. The End of Sea Farms Could Save Canada’s Salmon

The West Coast’s wild salmon stock has plummeted by as much as 85 per cent in the past 50 years. One major culprit? The proximity of commercial fish farms to salmon river runs, which can drastically shrink wild fish populations due to the spread of chemicals and parasites (hello, sea lice). In 2025, B.C. will begin a five-year process to phase out the $1.5-billion open-net salmon farming industry. The plan is to transition to land-based aquaculture, where fish swim happily in purified water tanks, far away from their wild brethren.

2. The Michelin Guide Will Arrive in Quebec

In 2025, three years after sprinkling a handful of Toronto restaurants with its prestigious stars, the Michelin Guide is expanding its Canadian presence into Quebec—the guide’s secret tasters are currently gobbling their way through La Belle Province. The expansion is a symbiotic arrangement between Michelin and various Quebec tourism boards: Destination Québec cité has coughed up $100,000 to cover the critics’ meals and hotel stays, while the Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions is contributing $450,000 over three years.

3. The Grocery Code of Conduct Will Come Into Effect 

In Canada, two companies control half of the grocery market: Loblaw, whose subsidiaries include No Frills, Fortinos and Real Canadian Superstore; and Empire, which owns Sobeys, FreshCo and Farm Boy. That gives them the power to charge suppliers fees to keep their products on shelves and to bargain for lower prices. The Grocery Code of Conduct, set to come into effect in 2025, will require grocery chains to stick to specific rules about fees, which could boost competition and foster a fairer relationship between stores and suppliers. The big five—Loblaw, Empire, Metro, Walmart and Costco—have all signed on, and customers could reap their own rewards: in countries with similar codes, grocery prices have gone down. 

4. Quebec Will Regulate Tipping

Tipping culture is a Wild West. Some people tip before tax, some after. Some stick to the old-fashioned 15 per cent, while others give in to the restaurant’s suggestion of a minimum 22 per cent. Some restaurants include tips in the bill, while others have abolished the practice altogether. In Quebec, an effort is under way to standardize the practice. A new bill proposes regulating suggested tips to ensure they reflect the before-tax total, saving customers from paying more than they intend. Servers, who rely on tips to make a living, are understandably miffed.

5. Restaurants Will Cater to Solo Diners

It used to be embarrassing to sit alone at a restaurant. Now, in an era of introverts, the solo dining movement is thriving: a recent survey found that some 43 per cent of diners had eaten out alone in the past year. Some restaurants are retooling to accommodate them—Yunnan Noodle Shack in Toronto, for example, separates its counter seats with voting booth–style dividers to ensure more privacy. Possible perks for those ditching their dining partners might include menu promotions, cheaper entrées and amenities like charging stations and books. Restaurants have a lot to gain: according to OpenTable, solo diners are big spenders, shelling out an average of $82 per meal.

6. B.C’s Wine Industry Will Face a Dry Spell

The Okanagan Valley produces some of the finest wine in Canada, but the last few years of extreme weather events have eviscerated the region’s vineyards. B.C. grape growers lost up to 58 per cent of their crops in 2023 and 99 per cent in 2024 due to once-rare, now-normal January deep freezes. As a result, the B.C. Wine Growers Association believes the supply of Okanagan wine will start dwindling in mid-2025 and that wines made solely from Okanagan fruit will become a rarity. To make up the difference, winemakers will likely bring in fruit and juice from other Canadian regions.

7. More Restaurants Will Go Bankrupt

Five years after the pandemic, restaurants are still scrambling to recover. The math works against them: discretionary spending is down, thanks to the rising prices of groceries and gas, while operating costs are way up: rent, insurance, equipment and food have all surged. As a result, hundreds of Canadian restaurants have gone bankrupt since 2021, and almost half of remaining places are operating at a loss or breaking even (pre-COVID, that number hovered closer to 10 per cent). The restaurant industry is pushing governments to enact new policies that will make it easier for them to stay open, such as lowering EI and CPP payments for employers, reducing licensing fees to sell alcohol and price-setting for dairy and poultry in restaurants. 

8. Fast-Food Restaurants Will Fight the Value-Meal Wars

Extravagant restaurant prices have trickled down to humble fast-food joints: McDonald’s prices have spiked by 168 per cent over the last decade, while Starbucks’ and Subway’s have surged by 39 per cent. To win back customers, many spots are introducing ultra-cheap value meals and deals. Tim Hortons, for example, has offered $3 breakfast sandwiches with a coffee purchase. The Quebec chicken chain St-Hubert recently entered the game, freezing prices on entrées and lowering them for appetizers and desserts. 

9. Food Banks Will Run Out of Supplies

The number of monthly food bank visits in Canada has doubled since 2019, hitting a record high of two million in 2024. Some food banks say their monthly user bases are more than 90 per cent above pre-pandemic levels. But the rise in food costs and demand have depleted the banks’ financial reserves, and donations are on the decline. As a result, many places won’t be able to keep serving the people who need them: the Ottawa Food Bank, which acts as a distributor for smaller organizations, says it will have to reduce the amount of food it supplies to its partners by 20 to 50 per cent starting in January. 

10. Restaurants Will Face Staffing Challenges

As part of a sweeping reversal to its immigration policy, the Canadian government recently announced that temporary foreign workers can make up no more than 10 per cent of a business’s labour force, down from 20 per cent. The goal is to give more opportunities to Canadian citizens and permanent residents, but the change could cause a labour squeeze for the restaurant industry, which relies on TFWs to work kitchen and service jobs. As a result of the cuts, restaurants might have to reduce opening hours or simplify menus.