In this podcast episode, we had the honour of hosting Bettina Hamelin, the esteemed President and C.E.O. of Ontario Genomics. Based in Ontario, this non-profit organization is pioneering in genomics and engineering biology, aiming to revolutionize various sectors for economic growth, improved quality of life, and global leadership for Ontario. Sylvain expressed his admiration for the Ontario government's vision in establishing and supporting such an innovative entity and their success in attracting top-notch leadership talent like Bettina.Moving onto other news, we discussed the recent policy reversal by Loblaw, lessons learned from it, and the fluctuating chicken prices in British Columbia. A significant development in environmental policy was also highlighted: Ottawa's consideration to require certain bakeries and restaurants using wood-fired ovens to report their air pollution emissions annually, a decision impacting Montreal's iconic bagels and pizzas.We also delved into a concerning surge in crime in Waterloo, where unknown suspects stole a truck and trailer loaded with pistachios worth approximately $70,000.Lastly, the podcast covered the uplifting news from Ottawa & Prince Edward Island, with the appointment of Mary Robinson to represent P.E.I. in Canada's Senate, signalling a bright future for the region's influence and representation, and great news for the Ag. sector.Ontario Genomics Ag and Food page: https://www.ontariogenomics.ca/sectors/agriculture-food/About BettinaBettina Hamelin, PharmD, EMBA is the President and CEO of Ontario Genomics, an Ontario-based not-for profit organization dedicated to catalyzing and supporting the development and commercialization of genomics- and engineering biology-based solutions across key sectors of the economy to drive economic growth, improved quality of life and global leadership for Ontario.Dr. Hamelin has over 30 years of experience in academia, industry, and not-for-profit organizations. She has held positions of increasing responsibility in the biotech and pharma industries including leadership positions at BioChem Pharma (Associate Director, DMPK) and Pfizer (Head, Strategic Research Partnerships, Western Canada; Director Vaccines, Pfizer Canada; Medical Director, Pfizer Germany; Global Scout, Pfizer Inc.). Dr. Hamelin also has 10 years of academic research expertise as a tenured professor at Université Laval. Prior to her current role, she served as VP of NSERC’s Research Partnerships Directorate, where she was responsible for stimulating increased public/private sector collaboration and technology transfer by connecting the Canadian research enterprise to Canadian and global innovation partners.Dr. Hamelin volunteers in the broader research and innovation community and serves on several advisory committees and the Boards of Directors of IRICoR and the Centre for Probe Development and Commercialization (CPDC) , and as a Mentor for the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL). Dr. Hamelin also chairs the National Engineering Biology Steering Committee and serves on Ontario’s COVID-19 Genomics Network Steering Committee.
About UsDr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Professor in food distribution and policy in the Faculties of Management and Agriculture at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University. Before joining Dalhousie, he was affiliated with the University of Guelph’s Arrell Food Institute, which he co-founded. Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. Google Scholar ranks him as one of the world's most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability.He has authored five books on global food systems, his most recent one published in 2017 by Wiley-Blackwell entitled “Food Safety, Risk Intelligence and Benchmarking”. He has also published over 500 peer-reviewed journal articles in s