David McInnes
As Principal of DMci Strategies, a consultancy dedicated to advance the success of the agri-food sector, David McInnes initiated and led a novel coalition of over 150 private-public partners from 2020 to 2024 to create Canada’s first agri-food sustainability index: the National Index on Agri-Food Performance.
He also founded the Centre for Agri-Food Benchmarking, a not-for-profit organization, to manage the coali<on and evolve the Index. David is a Senior Fellow and Steering Committee member of the Centre.
David is now moving forward with a new multistakeholder collaboration of some 27 agri-food and adjacent organizations with representation from across six con<nents. He founded the Collaborative Ag-food Advisory Group to improve the coherence of sustainability-related information flows generated within the agri-food sector for use with global standards and repor<ng frameworks. The issue is formative to enable agri-food trade and market access, enhance local and global food security and accelerate sustainability progress.
David is a board member of the National Circle on Indigenous Agriculture and Food (NCIAF) and with a provincial government agency, Agricultural Research and Innovation Ontario (ARIO). He is a steering member of the Agricultural Genomics in Action Centre and a State of Agriculture and the Environment initiative at the University of Guelph; he is also affiliated with McGill University’s Institute for Global Food Security.
Previously, David was President and CEO of the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute and held executive positions with a Canadian life sciences company, a global supplier of medical isotopes used to prevent, diagnose and treat disease. He also worked in corporate and government affairs for the country’s banking sector and he started his career working for the federal government. David is a past Chair of WaterAid Canada and a Trustee of London-based WaterAid International, an NGO dedicated to clean water and improved sanitation in the global south.
He is a graduate of the London School of Economics (MSc.) and Dalhousie University (B.A.).