February 22, 2026Welcome to Letters from CAMP, a newsletter on anti-monopoly activity in Canada and abroad, brought to you by the Canadian Anti-Monopoly Project. In this instalment we have:
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We’re Number OneIt’s Olympic season so we’re feeling suitably patriotic at CAMP. Unfortunately, alongside some disappointing hockey results, there’s another grim category in which Canada is leading the world: food inflation. In January, the annual rate of food inflation hit 7.3%, the highest among our G7 peers. The figure is another reminder that despite overall inflation falling, Canadians continue to struggle with elevated and steadily increasing food prices. But what should we expect when we continue to take a wait and see approach to stemming the rising tide of food costs? Thankfully the tide is turning in North America on the belief that we can’t do anything about food prices. In 2022, Mexico broke with economic orthodoxy by striking a bargain with major grocers that slowed the price growth of a basket of staples in exchange for supply-side measures that would increase production. The mood is catching. This week a major Democrat-aligned think tank, the Center for American Progress, released a report arguing for capping the price of a basket of basic goods paired with measures to increase competition and expand future food production. So, what should Canada’s response be? We have powerful tools across both federal and provincial governments to increase competition and bring down prices for Canadians. At the federal level, the government can invest in the Competition Bureau and point those stepped-up resources at the monopolies across the supply chain while flexing the ability fo supply management to tamp down price growth. At the provincial level, governments can ban practices by major grocers like property controls, exclusivity contracts, and supplier kickbacks that kill competition and squeeze consumers. With plenty of tools in the toolbox, we know that the wait and see approach is not delivering. If we want to arrest the rise in the cost of living, we need to intervene in the markets that matter. Canadians Want to Take Back Control of Social MediaThough we are stereotypically agreeable people, there isn’t much that 90% of Canadians agree on. But this week, it turns out that one of those things is reining in the excesses of major social media platforms, especially when it comes to kids. Polling this week shows that 90% of Canadians support an age-based ban on social media platforms and for platforms to be held responsible for the content they show young Canadians. Even for Big Tech critics like us, the level of support is striking. But it shouldn’t be. Canadians deserve a say over how the largest platforms for communication and commerce operate within our borders. These companies hold tremendous power as economic, social, and democratic infrastructure. Since the founding of this country Canadians have understood that companies that play these important roles are require regulation to ensure our interests are protected. Though we may have thought differently at the turn of the millennium, the internet has not changed this logic. Over the past year, the Big Tech regulation conversation has taken place in the shadow of Donald Trump and the Canada-U.S. trade relationship. We’ve been told that if we take a hands-off approach today, we’ll be rewarded with stability tomorrow. But we’ve seen what that’s got us so far. Abandoning the Digital Services Tax, which was projected to raise over $7 billion in annual revenue from digital giants, soothed trade tensions for approximately ten minutes. Canadians are clear that they want a say over how some of the world’s largest companies operate. Policymakers should listen to them. 📚 What We’re Reading 📚
American Mom and Pop Supermarkets Take on Food Giant MondelezIn New York City, one of the world’s largest food companies is threatening to take its cookies elsewhere. Mondelez, the multinational maker of familiar brands like Oreos, Ritz, and Wheat Thins, is ending its practice of direct distribution to independent grocery stores. As industry expert Errol Schweizer covers, the decision puts another middleman in between independent grocers and the goods they want to offer their customers. The expected outcome? Up to another dollar per good on top of already rising prices that will squeeze either consumers or the mom-and-pop shops serving them. But the association representing these grocers isn’t taking the decision laying down. They’re filing an antitrust suit against Mondelez arguing that the changes unfairly preferences larger stores with their own distribution infrastructure who will continue to have access to direct distribution pricing. The suit comes as New York lawmakers look to step up their antitrust game with the introduction of the Consumer Groceries Pricing Fairness Act which would expand the powers available to the state’s attorney general to go after similar anticompetitive practices. The case is a reminder of the importance of distribution in retail grocery competition and the value of companies being able to bring their own cases to protect fair competition. In the U.S. and Canada, the infrastructure that independent grocers rely on to compete is increasingly owned by the very superstores they’re competing with. This arrangement means fair competition protected by antitrust laws, including preventing the kind of discrimination that Mondelez is attempting, is more important than ever. We’ll be watching the case closely to see if American policymakers are able to give independent grocers a fair shot at competing. If you have any monopoly tips or stories you’d like to share, drop us a line at hello@antimonopoly.ca
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