Charlie Angelakos: 0:03

We're very encouraged by the results we're seeing, particularly, in New Brunswick. Emissions on the farm are down 30% versus control group farms in neighboring, areas, and also fertilizer use is down 17%. And it just doesn't stop there. We are seeing yields growing as well as a result of that

Tom Raftery: 0:26

Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening, wherever you are in the world. This is the Climate Confident podcast, the number one podcast showcasing best practices in climate emission reductions and removals. And I'm your host, Tom Raftery. Don't forget to click follow on this podcast in your podcast app of choice to be sure you don't miss any episodes. Hi everyone. And welcome to episode 202 of the Climate Confident podcast. This is the first episode of 2025. I hope you all had a wonderful break and a fantastic new year. We're starting off with an excellent episode today. Today's episode is with Charlie Angelakos, who is the Chief Sustainability Officer from McCain's Foods. The chip people where, we're talking about regenerative agriculture. And in the coming weeks, I'll be talking to Anders Lindberg who's president of Wartsila Energy. Angelo campus who's CEO of Box Power. Ollie Burch CEO of Among Equals and Thom Norman CEO of Farm Kind. So some excellent episodes to look forward to, but back to today's. And in today's episode, as I mentioned, I'll be talking to Charlie Angelakos from McCain's. So Charlie. Welcome to the podcast. Would you like to introduce yourself?

Charlie Angelakos: 1:45

Absolutely. And thanks, Tom for having me. My name is Charlie Angelakos, and I'm the Global VP of External Affairs and Sustainability at McCain Foods in Canada. McCain Foods is a global leader in prepared food products. As a fun fact, one in four French fries in the world is a McCain fries. We partner with 3,500 farmers around the world. And 6.8 million tons of potatoes every year are used and grown by our farmers.

Tom Raftery: 2:16

Nice. And I actually had some of your chips last night, Charlie, because I was making the Beyond Meat burgers and chips for my family for dinner last night. Not an overly healthy dinner, I think, but better than a beef burger. So we had some of your chips last night. Thanks for that.

Charlie Angelakos: 2:32

Thank you. And you'd be surprised as to how healthy our chips are.

Tom Raftery: 2:36

Great. And we'll, we'll get into that. So fantastic. What's your own journey to being in McCain because you've been in McCain a while, but before that you've had some other interesting positions as well, right?

Charlie Angelakos: 2:48

Yeah, absolutely. Well, thanks, Tom. I've been at McCain Foods for about four years now and it was exciting for me to join McCain having grown up in Canada, working for an iconic Canadian brand that is a global multinational really appealed to me. Prior to that, I spent 18 years in the beer business here in Canada, working for Labatt Breweries, which is a subsidiary of Anheuser Busch Imbev. And had a great time in the beer business. But here at McCain, it's a family owned company, and it's a very different environment, I would say, in that we don't fight quarter to quarter. We fight and make decisions for generations to come. And then prior to that I spent a bit of time in government where I was an aide to a prime minister in Canada, Jean Chrétien. Those were my formative years where I really learned the intersection between government policy communications. And when all that comes together, how much you can do, how much change you can impact in the future. This is really bring me back to my roots. I grew up in a small town in Canada. My father ran a restaurant business as all good Greek immigrants do and I have very fond memories of McCain fries coming in the back door and being delivered on a regular basis. So that was my first exposure to McCain and it's great how life comes full circle from that perspective.

Tom Raftery: 4:13

Fantastic. And Charlie, what would you say has surprised you most in your journey to where you are today?

Charlie Angelakos: 4:21

Really, when you think about it what has surprised me most along the way is no surprises along the way, meaning whether you are growing up in the hospitality industry working government and then going to a consumer package company, at its core everybody has ideals, commitments, and an agenda that they're working towards. So the surprise is really no surprise in that once you know you're a North Star and you work towards that, whether you are in government or as a company it's really fascinating to see how much change you can affect along the way.

Tom Raftery: 5:01

Nice, nice, nice and Charlie McCain's a set of old target for a hundred percent regenerative agriculture by 2030. people listening, can you break down, I've had a couple of episodes already talking about regenerative agriculture, but you know, just for people listening, can you break down what regenerative agriculture really means at McCain and what inspired the company to make such an ambitious goal?

Charlie Angelakos: 5:26

Yeah, for sure. At McCain, we define regenerative agriculture as an ecosystem based approach to farming, that aims to improve farm resilience, crop yield and quality. At its heart Tom, what we're trying to do is farm in harmony with nature to create synergies between agricultural production and the climate. So as an example, instead of disturbing the soil, we are protecting it by utilizing cover crops, for example, to ensure soil remains in place and does not deteriorate. Ensuring it holds water. And it's more self sustaining, right? Ultimately, we want to use less natural resources and focus on natural processes to reduce reliance on synthetics, limited water use and promote resilience. Now, I will say that's a very technical definition, but maybe Tom to answer your earlier question is, let's talk about The why, right? So, as a company McCain was founded, you know, 67 years ago, we built our business in partnership with our farming partners and our founders early on said, if we do not get the agronomy, right. Nothing else matters. And this is really about us getting the agronomy right, for our farmers. So back in 2018, we realized as a company that when we first started out, we would have one climate event around the world, Tom. Once every 10 or 15 years, whether it was a drought, extreme heat, fires and floods, and we would just deal with that as a business. But what we began to realize is we were dealing with more and more of those every year in different parts of the world. So, it would not be uncommon now for us to have five to 10 disasters around the world that we would have to deal with. So in 2018, we commissioned a climate study where we looked at previous historical climate patterns and then looked to the forward to 2050. And what we saw was very startling effects as to where our business was going to be and how our farmers would have to farm. So that really set in motion the burning platform and the need for us to ambitiously declare by 2030, all our acreage around the world would be farmed regeneratively.

Tom Raftery: 7:50

The issue I see there is that it's not your acreage. This is land that belongs to your, I think you said 3, 500 farmers. So, you need to work obviously very closely with them as your suppliers, in having them having to change some of their practices to become more regenerative so that you can reach your goals of being 100% regenerative by 2030, right?

Charlie Angelakos: 8:16

That's right? And now this is how we get into the how. So, what makes us different than other consumer packaged good companies is we have a direct to farmer relationship. So we do not deal with brokers. So what we did early on is we put the farmer at the center of the conversation. So instead of working off a PowerPoint in a boardroom, we talk directly to our farmers to work with them on laying out what is now known as the McCain regenerative agriculture code. So we worked with our farmers to talk about that at different levels and what would make sense for them, but we didn't stop there as well. We did intense focus groups with NGO governments, farming partners as well and other peers in the consumer package good space to pressure test what our code was to make sure that we were on the right track to get there. And then from there, we are working on training, with our farmers partners to train them along the way in terms of how things should be regeneratively farm our code. We have one code for the northern hemisphere and one code for the southern hemisphere, because obviously things are different. This is not a one size all solution. The other thing I would say outside of training, Tom is, we know that there's going to be a cost to the transition. So what we've done is we worked with our banking partners around the world to set up different, financial programs that would incent the, farmer on their journey, towards regenerative agriculture. So in some parts of the, world, we are backstopping loans and giving farmers access to capital. In other parts of the world, we may be writing off interests. And in other parts of the world, we are incenting our growers through contracts, meaning we will give them a long term contract and pay them a premium if they farmed regeneratively. So these are the types of things that we are putting in place to help the farmer along the journey together with us because we know that we cannot do it alone by dictating to the farmer, how things need to work. They have challenges every day. You know, in essence, we're dealing with 3500 unique business plans. So we have to be attuned to that and we continue to work with our folks on the ground to ensure that we're constantly listening and evolving to give the farmers the tools necessary, whether it's through training or financial means to help them along their journey.

Tom Raftery: 10:48

We've seen regenerative agriculture highlighted as a potential game changer for climate resilience in the past. For people listening who might be new to the concept, could you tell us what makes it more sustainable than traditional practices?

Charlie Angelakos: 11:05

Yeah for sure. Why don't I talk a little bit Tom about our farms of the future, 'cos I think that will show you in essence what we are trying to do So in addition to our 100% commitment to regenerative agriculture, we have also committed to three Farms Of The Future, and I'll explain what those are. We have one now in the province of New Brunswick here in Canada, where we started as a company, and we also have one in South Africa, and we will be in a position to announce our third one very soon. And what these are, are McCain owned commercial grade farms, where we are testing the hypothesis and practices around regenerative agriculture. So in a sense, it's a best practice hub where we are able to trial these techniques to make sure that we understand what's happening. And that where there are successes, we can share those with our farmer and our grower partners. And where there are failures, we can share those as well because at the end of the day, these are set up in a way that failing so that the farmer, does not have to fail. So you might ask why one in Canada? Why one in South Africa as an example? And that's very deliberately done for us because in Canada as an example, that is a one growing season farm. So we can export best practices from Canada into neighboring United States, but in South Africa, it's a four growing season farm. So we can take what we're doing on the farm in South Africa and educate one of our farming partners in Latin America on these techniques. Now. It's early days on the farm, Tom, but we're very encouraged by the results we're seeing, particularly, in New Brunswick. Emissions on the farm are down 30% versus control group farms in neighboring, areas, and also fertilizer use is down 17%. And it just doesn't stop there. We are seeing yields growing as well as a result of that. So it is early days along the way. But we're very encouraged by what we're seeing and what excites us about the Farms Of The Future is what I've learned very quickly, is farming is a show me industry. A farmer wants to be shown that what you're actually telling them to do is actually working and through these farms of the future we're able to do just that. We're able to test out the hypothesis and show our farming partners the benefits of the regenerative agriculture journey that we're all on.

Tom Raftery: 14:05

Are you seeing changes in the soil health as well as a consequence of this?

Charlie Angelakos: 14:09

Absolutely. We're seeing it through the cover cropping that we're instituting as part of this. We're seeing a lot of different changes in the soil. We're doing DNA bar coding on the farm as well, which allows us to set up a baseline on the soil. It's pretty impressive when you tour it because you can see a field that has been regeneratively farmed versus a field that's not regeneratively farmed. And you can see The effects of a regeneratively farmed field on the soil, whether it's seeing the earthworms that are coming here, the water retention that we're seeing, we're not seeing as much runoff as well, and, step one for us in our regenerative agriculture journey is to get a soil testing baseline for our farmers because soil is absolutely critical and that's getting to a much better place.

Tom Raftery: 15:00

And I got to think as well, it's going to be, sequestering more carbon and also increasing local biodiversity, particularly with using cover crops.

Charlie Angelakos: 15:10

That's right So we're using cover crops as well. We've also integrated livestock on the farm with green manure and whatnot as well. We're also experimenting with traffic controlled tillage so that we are telling the right way on the same row and minimizing soil disturbance. So these are the type of things that we are trying out to see what works. And again, like I said, some things are going to work and some things aren't but at the end of the day this is really about us trialing these techniques in order to train our farmer to get to a much better place.

Tom Raftery: 15:44

What kind of obstacles have you come up with on this journey towards regenerative practices? be it financial, be it adoption, be it whatever?

Charlie Angelakos: 15:53

You know, so far we've been very fortunate in the reception that we are getting from our farming partners. I think all of us recognise the effects of climate change and the effects climate change is having on farming. So again, we built our business in partnership with the farmer. And this is really about us working together to build a durable, you know, food supply chain system for years to come. So, from a practice's perspective what we found is when we did cover cropping on the Farm Of The Future in New Brunswick, we chose the wrong crop, right? The last year we would have used rye as a cover crop, but then that turned into a weed that was competing with the potato on the nutrients that it needed to draw from the ground to grow. That's one piece. The second piece is really about getting the right training in place and bringing folks along that journey. And then the third piece is financial. We know how difficult it is for our farming partners to run the farm. So, you know, we are putting those supports in place to ensure that at least we have a menu of options for our farming partners to draw on as they go along the journey towards regenerative agriculture.

Tom Raftery: 17:09

Okay. And how do you see the role of big food companies like McCain in helping move the needle on climate action, especially in sectors like agriculture, where change can be slow and systemic?

Charlie Angelakos: 17:23

Absolutely. Collaboration is absolutely critical and key for us, Tom. This is not about competitive advantage for us. This is really about all of us in the agricultural value chain and the food manufacturing value chain on working together to get to a much better place. And it's through organisations like the Sustainable Markets Initiative in the UK, whether it's One Planet for Biodiversity in Europe, or the Canadian Alliance for Net Zero Agriculture here in Canada, it's all these food companies coming together to talk about what we can all do together to get to a much better place. And that comes through whether it's working on pilots where we can work together, whether it's working on a standardised set of metrics in terms of how we're going to measure regenerative agriculture. One thing I will say is if you're asking me, what causes me a little angst at night. I think there is a bit of sustainability fatigue among our farming partners, and that's not a bad thing. It's not a criticism. It's just in isolation. If it was just McCain Foods coming out with a series of commitments that says this is what we want our farmers and our growers to do would be one thing. But you have so many companies layering on pressure on the farmer who we rely on for the, outcomes that we need. So the quicker we can all work together to get to a standardised set of metrics and standardisation in process for our farmer. I think we will all get to a very much better place.

Tom Raftery: 18:58

Makes a lot of sense. On the consumer side, a lot of consumers might not realize the climate impact behind their food choices. So are you going out and communicating the importance of sustainable farming to consumers who, you know, like to pick up a bag of chips every now and again and throw them in the oven in my case or throw them in the fryer if you're frying them?

Charlie Angelakos: 19:24

The consumer piece is a very important one. We have spent the last few years ensuring that we got it right with the farmer. Meaning we had the training in place. We had the financing in place. And now that's done, it is important for all of us to turn our minds to how we can educate the consumer on regenerative agriculture. There was a study done in Europe by the Demos Think Tank that said only 3 in 10 folks knew what regenerative meant. So I think that that is really important for all of us to start to educate the consumer from that way. From a McCain perspective, there are a few things that we've done from a consumer perspective. Two years ago, we launched an interactive game targeted at, The next gen consumer where they were able to work within this game to learn about regenerative techniques along the way. So they were in a virtual farm as an example. In the UK we have launched regenerative agriculture ads that are starting to show fruit if I can say that for lack of a better word with our consumers. And the latest iteration of that had Vinnie Jones who is a former footballer in the UK and an actor through Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and he was a very effective spokesperson for us along the way. So I think you will start to see more and more things ladder up to a consumer perspective. And again yeah. The onus is on all of us to make sure that we can educate everybody on the benefits of regenerative, because at the end of the day, as more consumers learn about those benefits, it's going to be a lot easier for us to bring our farmer partners along as well.

Tom Raftery: 21:04

And is it a push or a pull with consumers or a mix of both?

Charlie Angelakos: 21:10

I would say it is a mix of both. I would say it's very early for me to stand here and say every consumer knows what regenerative is. So I think it's going to be we're still a ways out from doing that. And we are doing our bit and you'll see more and more coming along. In a way, we need to educate the consumer the same way we had to work with our farming partners as well. So it's early days. I'm hopeful that we are going to get to a much better place from that perspective. But we will get there through the different things that we've tried and at the end of the day the consumer will be absolutely critical, for us to achieve our goal as well.

Tom Raftery: 21:49

Speaking about movies, we've had food icons like from Ratatouille's Remy the Rat to Chef Gusteau. Who would you say is the real hero in McCain's sustainability story? Is it the farmers, the researchers, or maybe the chips themselves?

Charlie Angelakos: 22:05

I'm doubling down on the farmer. Like I said, Tom, we built our business in partnership with the farmer. At the end of the day, as our founder says, if we do not get the agronomy right, nothing else matters. And we cannot get the agronomy right without our farming partner. Now the unsung hero also in all of this is the potato. Out of all vegetables, the potato emits the lowest amount of greenhouse gas in the world. So it is a very environmentally friendly vegetable as well.

Tom Raftery: 22:37

And being Irish, I concur completely with that. For, for listeners who were interested in supporting regenerative agriculture, are there labels or company commitments or things like that to help make climate conscious choices?

Charlie Angelakos: 22:55

There is no standard label yet. What I would encourage, consumers to do is to do their research on what companies are working towards regenerative agriculture. I would encourage folks to go to our website to learn more about our code and the progress that we are making. I would also encourage them to come on and listen to our podcast, The Hot Potato podcast, which talks a lot about regenerative agriculture and can educate, themselves on the journey that we're on at McCain, but that's not just the McCain podcast as well. We bring others within the value chain as well to have that conversation with us as well.

Tom Raftery: 23:33

Great. just going back to what you said earlier as well, about different demands on the farmers and now as well, talking about the consumers. With sustainability as a global issue, do you think large food brands could ever come together to create something like an industry wide standard for regenerative practices? And, you know, what would it take for that to happen?

Charlie Angelakos: 23:53

We are working on that through different industry bodies. There is something called the FAI Platform, Tom, where a lot of major food companies are there that are working on a standardised set of metrics. So I am hopeful that soon there will be a standardised set of metrics. And what's great about this one is it's folks who understand the business who are pulling these metrics together. So it's not a government body or anything like that. It's people around the table who are attuned to the science and the metrics and the challenges that our farming partners go through. So we are trying to come together with a practical measured set of metrics that can help all of us align ourselves that at the end of the day will benefit not just that, but that the farmer as well at the farming level as they work towards implementing regenerative agriculture.

Tom Raftery: 24:45

And for young farmers or climate conscious listeners tuning in, what's one piece of advice you'd share about the potential needed for this kind of systemic change, regenerative agriculture demands?

Charlie Angelakos: 25:00

Look, we're at a moment in time right now where in order for us to meet our climate goals of minus one and a half and still feed the world population, we need to triple the current rate of regenerative agriculture. And I can say from a McCain perspective and things I'm seeing around the world, I'm excited about the future. I'm excited at, what we're seeing on The Farms Of The Future and at our demo farms. I'm excited about all value chain players coming to the table. In particular financial institutions who are coming to help us with that transition. I'm excited about the collaboration that is happening at different tables where all of us in the food industry recognise that this isn't about a competitive advantage. It's really about getting to a much, much better place.

Tom Raftery: 25:52

And, Left field question. If you could have any person or character, alive or dead, real or fictional, as a spokesperson for regenerative agriculture, who would it be and why?

Charlie Angelakos: 26:05

I think the farmer. I don't think it is any one emblematic person. I think it's the farmer who lives the reality of growing food, and the importance of growing climate conscious food day in and day out. Look, I think celebrities obviously have a role to play. It's one small role in a complicated way that we're going to get to this much better place.

Tom Raftery: 26:30

Okay. We're coming towards the end of the podcast now, Charlie. Is there any question I didn't ask that you wish I did or any aspect of this we haven't touched on that you think it's important for people to think about?

Charlie Angelakos: 26:41

No, I would just leave listeners with this, Tom. This regenerative agriculture is for us really about two things. Sure, it's about mitigating climate change, but it's also about us working in partnership with our farming partners to build a strong, resilient food supply chain system for the years to come. So when we talk about regenerative agriculture, for us, it's not just about climate. Climate is an added benefit about regenerative agriculture, but this is really about us working together with our farming partners to build a strong, viable future for them as well, because at the end of the day, we know we built our business in partnership with the farmer. And, in order for us to survive as a business, we need our farming partners to thrive as well. And again, this is about us working together to build what the future looks like for us from a food supply chain system.

Tom Raftery: 27:39

Charlie if people would like to know more about yourself or any of the things we discussed on the podcast today, where would you have me direct them?

Charlie Angelakos: 27:46

You can if you want to know a little bit more about me, which I doubt you can find me on LinkedIn at Charlie Angelakos. You can also go to our mccain. com website where you can see, not just our sustainability commitments, but you can find Farm Of The Future reports where we'll dig more deeply into our regenerative agriculture code along with different successes we've had at the Farms of the Future and also through, obviously, the Hot Potato podcast, which is on all streaming platforms as well.

Tom Raftery: 28:19

Great. I'll put links to those in the show notes, Charlie so everyone will find them quick enough. Great. Charlie, that's been fascinating. Thanks a million for coming on the podcast today.

Charlie Angelakos: 28:28

Thank you so much, Tom. Really appreciated the time.

Tom Raftery: 28:32

Okay, we've come to the end of the show. Thanks everyone for listening. If you'd like to know more about the Climate Confident podcast, feel free to drop me an email to tomraftery at outlook. com or message me on LinkedIn or Twitter. If you like the show, please don't forget to click follow on it in your podcast application of choice to get new episodes as soon as they're published. Also, please don't forget to rate and review the podcast. It really does help new people to find the show. Thanks. Catch you all next time.