Privacy Policy
Last modified: July 3, 2025
Overview
The Canadian Food Innovation Network (“CFIN”, “we”, “us”, “our” or similar pronouns) is a not-for-profit corporation incorporated under the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act.
By using any of our “Services” (including, without limitation, contacting us by email, accessing our website located at https://www.cfin-rcia.ca/ (including all subdomains, collectively, our “Website”), accessing our YODL and/or Resource Finder tools, completing any CFIN general membership or CFIN+ membership registration, registering for any of our events and/or applying to any of our programs), you accept the terms of this Privacy Policy. We collect Personal Information (as defined below) from you to create and maintain a responsible business relationship, to meet legal and regulatory requirements and to provide service excellence throughout the Canadian Food Innovation Network. Your use of our Website and/or other Services constitutes consent to the usage of your Personal Information as described in this Privacy Policy and as set out in our Terms of Use, the provisions of which you also agree to and accept by using any of our Services.
IF YOU DO NOT AGREE WITH THE PROVISIONS OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY, THEN YOU MUST CEASE USING OUR WEBSITE AND OUR OTHER SERVICES IMMEDIATELY AND YOU MUST NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION TO US.
“Personal Information” is information that identifies or that can be used, on its own or with other information, to identify a single individual. Such information may include an individual’s name, address, phone number, email address, birth date, financial information, computer IP address, etc.
This Privacy Policy applies to all of your Personal Information that we collect, use, store and/or otherwise process in connection with your use of our Services.
The Personal Information CFIN May Collect and How It Is Used
We limit our collection of your Personal Information to that which is necessary for the purposes identified in this Privacy Policy and only through fair and lawful means. We may collect Personal Information from you when you engage in the use of our Services. In particular, we may collect your Personal Information when:
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you create a general CFIN membership or a CFIN+ membership and, in each such case, a related account through our Website;
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you sign up to receive email communications from us;
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you apply or register for any CFIN programs or events; and/or
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you contact us with questions, comments or complaints including, without limitation, through our Website’s Chatbot functions.
Membership Generally: You do not need to create a CFIN membership to visit our Website although certain Services accessible through our Website and other features of our Website may require that you register and provide Personal Information such as your name, email address, residential or shipping address(es), phone number and/or a password that you create. If you choose to register for CFIN membership, then you will be required to provide all such Personal Information to us. This Personal Information is used to provide and administer the Services that we provide to you and to help us better understand the visitors to our Website and our Members including for statistical analysis and to better customize our Services.
CFIN+ Membership: If you apply for CFIN+ membership, then in addition to providing such Personal Information as your name, email address, residential or shipping address(es), phone number and/or a password that you create, you must also provide credit card information to pay for all applicable fees. We use Stripe for payment processing and certain analytics and other business services. Stripe collects Personal Information about the devices that connect to its services to operate and improve the services it provides to us, including for fraud detection. Stripe encrypts all credit card information in their database and is PCI DSS compliant to ensure the security of all such information. Learn more about Stripe’s privacy policy and related matters at its website accessible here: Stripe Privacy Center. We do not store any credit card information on our Website and only the final four (4) digits of your credit card number can be seen by our staff, which Personal Information may be used to identify you in certain circumstances.
Email Communications: If you register to receive email communications from us about our Services, programs or events or other matters that may interest you, then we collect Personal Information from you such as your name and email address by your explicit consent. This Personal Information is used to send you related email communications although you will always be free to opt out of receiving emails from us by following the “unsubscribe” instructions in any of our emails or by contacting us as described below in this Privacy Policy.
Programs / Events: If you register to attend or be part of any CFIN programs or events, then we collect Personal Information from you such as your name and email address by your explicit consent. This Personal Information is used to allow you to participate in and receive materials related to our programs and events with respect to which you specifically request access. We use SmartSimple’s services for processing certain funding program applications and your Personal Information may be provided to SmartSimple’s website with your explicit permission for such processing.
Contacts: If you contact us with any questions, comments or complaints including, without limitation, through our Website’s Chatbot functions, then you may be asked to provide Personal Information such as your name, address, email address and/or phone number together with additional information relating to your specific concern(s). We use this Personal Information to respond to your questions, comments and complaints.
How Do We Use “Cookies” Or Other Online Tracking Mechanisms?
As you navigate through and interact with our Website, we may use cookies, web beacons, tracer tags and/or other automatic data collection technologies to collect certain information about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns, which technologies include small computer files that our Website sends to your computer's hard drive through your Internet browser (if you allow) that enables our Website and related systems to recognize your browser and capture and remember certain information (collectively, “cookies”).
We may maintain information we collect from cookies or associate it with Personal Information we collect or that you provide us. Cookies generally help us to improve our Website and to deliver a better and more personalized service to our Website’s users and our customers. As examples, we use cookies:
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to identify your computer or other device and Internet connection including, without limitation, your IP address, operating system and browser type.
You can choose to have your computer or other device to warn you each time a cookie is being sent, to refuse all or some cookies or you can choose to turn off all cookies. You do this through your browser (like Internet Explorer or Apple Safari) settings. Each browser is a little different, so look at your browser's Help menu to learn the correct way to modify your cookies.
Some Website content or applications are served by third parties including content providers, social media platforms and application providers. These third parties may use cookies to collect information about you when you use our Website and may collect Personal Information about your online activities over time and across different website and other online services. They may use this information to provide you with interest-based (behavioral) advertising or other targeted content. We do not allow third party behavioral tracking on our Website.
We also use third party cookies to run Google Analytics Demographics and Interest Reporting. These cookies gather website visitor data (such as age, gender, and interests) to optimize website content and marketing and do not collect any Personal Information.
To opt-out of Analytics for the web, please visit the Google Analytics opt-out page (https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/) and install the add-on for your browser. For more details on installing and uninstalling the add-on, please see the relevant help resources for your specific browser.
Retention and Sharing of Personal Information
We retain your Personal Information that we collect for as long as is necessary to fulfill identified legal or business purposes as set out in this Privacy Policy. We do not share your Personal Information with third parties, except as provided below.
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At your request or with your consent including, without limitation, as may be required to process applications for funding programs.
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We may disclose your Personal Information to our affiliates and other persons who provide services for us. As explained above, your Personal Information can be shared with Stripe, the payment processor we use to manage CFIN+ memberships. We may also use service providers to host our Website and other Services and/or to operate certain features thereof, to authorize and process payments, to send communications, to process applications for funding programs, to conduct customer research and/or to manage and analyze data including for fraud detection purposes. Any access to your Personal Information by our affiliates and service providers will be limited to that which is necessary for them to provide their required services and we do not and will not authorize them to use or disclose your Personal Information for any other purposes.
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When using third party websites that are linked from our Website, some of your Personal Information may be shared with or housed on third party websites (e.g. including, without limitation. when applying for funding programs and/or registering for events), which third party websites may have access to your Personal Information. CFIN strongly recommends that you review and familiarize yourself with the privacy policy of any webpage that you are on or that is linked from our Website because CFIN has no control over the privacy practices of third parties.
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In certain circumstances, we may share and/or are obliged to share your Personal Information with third parties in response to search warrants or other legal inquiries or orders or to investigative bodies pursuant to applicable allegations of breach of contract, contravention of law or as required by applicable laws. We may also disclose your Personal Information where necessary to establish, exercise or defend against legal claims, to exercise our rights and/or as otherwise permitted by applicable laws.
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We may also disclose your Personal Information in connection with a corporate re-organization, merger or amalgamation with another entity, sale of all or a substantial portion of our assets, including any due diligence exercise carried out in relation to any such transaction(s), provided that the Personal Information disclosed continues to be used for the purposes permitted by this Privacy Policy by the entity acquiring the Personal Information.
International Storage and Transfer of Personal Information:
For us to provide our Services, we may collect, use, disclose, transfer, store and/or process your Personal Information for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy on servers that are located outside of your jurisdiction including, without limitation, in any Canadian province or in the United States. Please note that the privacy laws in such jurisdictions may differ from Canadian privacy laws (including differing from the privacy laws of the Province of Quebec). Reasonable contractual or other measures we may take to protect your Personal Information while it is processed or handled by this service providers are subject to applicable foreign legal requirements including, without limitation, lawful requirements to disclose Personal Information to applicable government authorities and law enforcement in certain circumstances. By submitting your Personal Information to us or accessing or engaging with our Website or one of its subdomains, you consent to such collection, use, disclosure, transfer, storage and/or processing.
If you would like to obtain more information about our policies and practices with respect to the transfer and processing of Personal Information outside of Canada and/or the Province of Quebec, please contact us in any of the ways described in the “Contact Us” section of this Privacy Policy.
What Other Websites Do We Link To:
Unless provided in this Privacy Policy, we will not share any of your Personal Information with any third party websites without your consent. We include links to third party websites for the convenience of our Website users and certain members only. Because these third party websites operate independently from us, we strongly recommend that you read and understand the privacy policies, terms of use and other legal notices of each third party website to which our Website provides any links that you use. We have no control over any third party website, even if we provide links to any such sites and, as such, we cannot accept any responsibility for their data collection, use, security, disclosure or other practices.
How We Secure Your Personal Information
CFIN is responsible for all Personal Information in its possession or custody, including Personal Information that has been transferred to us through any third party. We have taken steps to ensure that all Personal Information collected will remain secure and in its original form, free from any alteration. Access to all Personal Information (except publicly available information) is strictly controlled. We have put in place reasonable physical, technical, and administrative procedures to safeguard and help prevent unauthorized access and to maintain data security.
We endeavor to take reasonable precautions to maintain adequate administrative, technical and physical measures in an effort to safeguard Personal Information under our custody and control against loss, misuse, unauthorized access, modification and disclosure. That said, please note that the safety and security of your Personal Information is also your responsibility. Some of your Personal Information may be accessible online and protected by a password you have created. We strongly recommend that you never disclose your password to anyone. If you suspect your password has been compromised, please contact us immediately. We also use Secure Socket Layer (SSL) security for authentication and private communications in an effort to maintain your confidence by providing simple and secure access and communication of payment and other Personal Information. We will never ask you for your password in any unsolicited communication, such as by regular mail, phone calls or emails.
We have designated a Privacy Officer who is responsible for ensuring our compliance with this Privacy Policy. You may contact our Privacy Officer with any questions, comments or complaints via the contact details provided at the end of this Privacy Policy.
Your Rights to Your Personal Information
You may decline to consent, or revoke your consent, to the collection, use, and disclosure of your Personal Information for all, or any purposes. If, however, you do so in respect of the Personal Information required for the processing of a project proposal or assessing or updating credit worthiness of a proponent, then the related assessment of your proposal may be terminated. There may also be instances where we are not able to comply with a request to withdraw consent.
You may opt not to have your Personal Information used to receive communications about CFIN programs, events and Services or regular CFIN communications. If you wish to decline or revoke your consent for your Personal Information to be used for such communication purposes, then you will be provided with a method to opt out.
You may also request: (i) access to specific Personal Information collected about you; (ii) to know the categories of Personal Information we have collected about you; (iii) to know the categories of sources from which your Personal Information is collected; (iv) to know how we use your Personal Information; (v) to know to whom your Personal Information has been disclosed; and (vi) that we delete your Personal Information, subject to limited exceptions prescribed by law.
All requests must be made in writing, and we must be able to verify your identity before we are able to release your Personal Information to you. Providing you with your Personal Information more than twice in a 12-month period is at our discretion.
We may not discriminate against you for exercising any of your rights permitted by law, including your right to request your Personal Information as described above. Note that some Services may no longer be available to you if you request that your Personal Information be modified or deleted. We will explain the consequences of deletion at that time to assist you in your decision.
We make reasonable efforts to ensure Personal Information is accurate and complete. You may make a request to update, correct or delete your Personal Information at any time through the Edit Member Profile function on our Website or by contacting us at the email address in the “Contact Us” section of this Privacy Policy. You are responsible for maintaining the accuracy of the Personal Information that you submit to us.
We may not accommodate a request to change your Personal Information if we have reason to believe doing so would violate any applicable law or other legal requirement or would cause the relevant Personal Information to be incorrect. Applicable laws may also allow or require us to refuse to provide you with access to some or all of your Personal Information that we hold, or that we may have destroyed, erased or anonymized in accordance with our record retention obligations and practices. If we cannot provide you with access to any of your Personal Information that we hold, then, subject to any applicable legal or regulatory restrictions, we will inform you of the reasons why.
Changes to this Privacy Policy
We may need to make changes to this Privacy Policy at any time. If we make material changes to how we collect your Personal Information, or how we use or disclose it, we will post or provide appropriate notice in accordance with applicable law. Our treatment of your Personal Information will be governed by the version of the Privacy Policy in effect from time to time; consequently, please review this Privacy Policy on a regular basis and contact us if you have any questions.
By continuing to access and use our Website and/or other Services, you agree to the terms of the then-current Privacy Policy as amended.
All users and/or visitors to our Website may discontinue receiving marketing communications from us. To discontinue or unsubscribe to our marketing communications, you must update your email preferences located in your Account information on our Website or you can select to unsubscribe on any marketing communication that we send, which will remove you from future marketing communications.
The CFIN Privacy Officer is responsible for CFIN’s compliance with applicable privacy legislation. For further information, to exercise your rights, to challenge CFIN’s compliance or if you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact the Privacy Officer. If a complaint is made and found to be justified, through compliance review, CFIN will take appropriate measures, including amending its policies and practices if necessary.
CFIN’s Privacy Officer can be contacted at:
Privacy Officer, Canadian Food Innovation Network
7382 Wellington County Road 30, Unit B
Our Privacy Officer reviews all complaints within a reasonable time and if a complaint is determined to be justified, then our Privacy Officer will conduct an investigation and take appropriate steps to remediate the issue including, if necessary, amending our policies and procedures, safeguards and information management practices. Our Privacy Officer will inform any complainant as to the result of any investigation within 30 calendar days from receipt of the related complaint. If, however, an investigation requires additional time to be thoroughly completed, then our Privacy Officer will provide the complainant with a timeline for completion.
Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Individuals can also submit a complaint to their provincial privacy regulator