Over the past year, the Golden Horseshoe Food and Farming Alliance (GHFFA) has completed a major enhancement of the ConnectON platform through support from the Grassroots Growth Initiative (GGI). The project has significantly expanded Ontario’s most comprehensive municipal business mapping platform while providing municipalities with new tools to better understand and strengthen their local agri-food network.
One of the largest accomplishments was a province-wide data refresh that added or updated more than 65,000 new business assets to ConnectON while archiving thousands of older records. The work included the integration of new manufacturing businesses, updates to the Farm Business Registry data, municipal business directory refreshes, and extensive quality assurance through de-duplication and geocoding processes. Together, these efforts have substantially improved the completeness and accuracy of ConnectON’s business inventory.
The project also introduced a suite of new enhancements designed specifically to support Agricultural Systems planning under Ontario’s 2024 Provincial Planning Statement. Users can now explore a dedicated Agri-Food Network sector that brings together businesses across the agricultural value chain, helping municipalities better visualize the relationships that support local food production, processing, distribution and services.
To complement this new sector, GHFFA developed over 120 new municipal dashboard pages that provide community-specific statistics and insights. We also developed an enhanced dynamic legend that automatically adapts to the data being displayed, so complex business maps are easier to interpret. Behind the scenes, ConnectON was updated to the latest NAICS classification system, ensuring users have access to current industry definitions across more than 1,200 business categories.
Beyond technology improvements, the project focused on building municipal capacity. More than 60 municipal staff participated in virtual training sessions introducing the new tools. All users are encouraged to check out the updated user guides, video tutorials and request one-on-one training. GHFFA also continued expanding ConnectON’s municipal network by onboarding lower-tier municipalities and integrating new municipal boundary layers into the platform.
This project represents another step toward GHFFA’s long-term vision of making high-quality, business-level data accessible to municipalities across Ontario. Today, ConnectON serves more than 300 active users from over 100 municipalities and municipal organizations, helping planners, economic development officers and other municipal staff make more informed, data-driven decisions.
As the project concludes, the benefits will continue well beyond the project timelines. Municipal partners now have access to richer data, improved analytical tools and a stronger foundation for agricultural systems planning, economic development and investment attraction. GHFFA looks forward to building on this momentum and supporting municipalities as ConnectON continues to grow.