Élise Legendre (she/her)

Élise is a proud public servant, passionate about the role of government and the impact it can have to improve the quality of life for all in Canada – she joined the federal public service in 2003.

In the summer of 2021, she was appointed as Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s first Chief Data Officer where she leads an enthusiastic and diverse team of multidisciplinary professionals dedicated to harnessing and unleashing the power of data and information to improve service delivery and to support the agriculture and agri-food sector’s sustainable growth.

An inspiring leader, driving transformation by creating vision, bringing people to solve complex problems together and being relentlessly focused on risk smart, agile execution, she consistently delivers tangible results – like the launch of AgPal Chat, the Government of Canada first public facing tool using generative AI in April 2024.

Élise holds a Masters in Business Administration from Simon Fraser University (Vancouver, BC) and a Bachelor's degree in arts, major in Political Sciences from Laval University (Sainte Foy, QC).