Egg Farmers of Canada (EFO) announced the release of its National Environmental Sustainability Tool (NEST), an innovative online tool that empowers Canadian egg farmers to measure, monitor and manage the environmental footprint of their own farm. With the beta version of NEST, farmers can perform a sustainability assessment of their farm to understand key drivers of environmental performance, including energy and water use, while also exploring comparisons to farms in their region and across the country.

“With the growing demand and uses of eggs comes the responsibility to produce eggs sustainably, which is why our nation’s egg sector and our hard working egg farmers from coast to coast remain committed to continually improving operations and practices and why we invest in innovation and new tools like NEST,” said Tim Lambert, CEO of Egg Farmers of Canada. “The development of NEST is part of our broader, holistic vision of sustainability. As egg farming continues to grow, enabling more sustainable agriculture will continue to play a central role in securing a strong, prosperous future for the industry and for Canada.”

The Canadian egg industry has been working to make gains to its environmental sustainability over time, with egg production emitting substantially less greenhouse gas and using less water, land and energy than it did 50 years ago, according to an EFO press release. With NEST, egg farmers the organisation believes its members will be able to remain at the forefront of implementing green technologies and new innovations. Providing on-demand access to the latest agricultural sustainability research, farmers will be able to use NEST to create an action plan, set sustainability goals, track progress and work towards making their farms even more sustainable.

“Innovation is essential to driving new sustainable practices,” said Nathan Pelletier, Egg Farmers of Canada Research Chair in Sustainability at the University of British Columbia Okanagan. “Egg farmers collect a massive amount of data on energy, feed, and water use, as well as farm operating parameters and conditions.

"What we’re doing is facilitating the anonymous aggregation of this information so that farmers can see where they fit in the broader spectrum of sustainability performance and consider options to further reduce their environmental footprints," he continued. "And—in the spirit of continuous improvement—future versions of NEST will include more detailed assessments that also take into account economic considerations and animal welfare data. It’s an exciting time to be part of Canadian agriculture.