Bill C-359

An Act to amend the Feeds Act, the Seeds Act and the Pest Control Products Act (provisional registration and approval)

This enactment amends the Feeds Act , the Seeds Act and the Pest Control Products Act to provide for provisional registration or approval of feeds, seeds and pest control products that are already approved by two or more trusted jurisdictions.

[Jeffrey Walsh, Director, Apple Grower, Nova Scotia Fruit Growers' Association]

Good morning, everyone.

Distinguished committee members and fellow presenters, my name is Jeffrey Walsh. I am a third generation apple farmer from Rockland, Nova Scotia. I'm here representing the Nova Scotia Fruit Growers' Association as the recently elected vice-president.

Our association represents tree fruit growers of Nova Scotia, which means primarily apples, but we also grow pears, peaches and other stone fruit.

The NSFGA was created in 1863 and has a long history of promoting education and advocacy among farmers. Over the last 30 years, Nova Scotia apple growers have invested in high-density orchards of valuable new varieties, making us a leader in Canada's production of apples.

Today I'm going to speak on three issues facing our industry.

The first issue is pest management and crop protection products required for growing apples.

As a farmer, I see the challenges that arise when certain products are either deregistered or limited to the extent that it's impractical to use them at all. The PMRA, or Pesticide Management Regulatory Agency, is responsible for rules and decides which products are allowed or not. The pest management centre, or PMC, is a different body that helps generate new data for guiding rules around pesticide use.

While the PMRA has been undergoing work to become more transparent and accountable, the PMC does not seem to be receiving the same support. The PMC collects data through research and studies that provide information on important decisions that have enormous impacts on our industry. As an example, many apple farmers in Canada are facing a serious disease in orchards called “fireblight”, which causes trees to die. There are limited products to fight this disease, and the ones we do have are essential to protecting our orchards. If we lose them, our entire industry is in jeopardy.

We need to invest in solid data and evidence to prove the safety and efficacy of these products and also to seek good alternatives if there are reasons to, so that we can continue to grow food. This leads me to my final point on this topic, which is that our association supports private member's Bill C-359. We should take advantage of work in other trusted jurisdictions to allow quicker access to safe and tested crop protection products for our Canadian farms.

The second issue is labour. Most horticulture farmers take advantage of seasonal agricultural worker and temporary foreign worker programs. These programs are essential to our businesses, and we could not farm successfully without them.

Some of these programs require the provision of on-farm housing, meaning that farmers are either buying or building accommodation, which is a huge cost. Due to the current housing market, many are choosing to build new; however, as I recently discovered after investing in accommodations of my own, none of the HST on the new build was eligible for an input tax credit, due to a policy of the Department of Finance. This came as a shock, as most other commercial necessities on farms are eligible for a rebate.

Along with the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, we are requesting that this be changed, and we encourage you to support us in this work. It would help farms with cash flow and encourage more investment in worker housing. It's really important that farmers provide high-quality homes for employees to live in, as we want them to feel safe, valued and comfortable in their housing and hopefully return to us year after year.

As a final note on labour, I want to recognize the Government of Canada for implementing the recognized employer pilot, which has made it easier for farmers to apply and has reduced red tape while also ensuring that those who do not follow the rules are restricted in accessing these programs. It's imperative that we work together to make sure the employees and the farmers are benefiting and the rules are being followed.

The final issue I want to briefly to speak on today is cost. It's becoming more expensive to grow food, and despite high prices in grocery stores, farmers are seeing declining returns. For costs like labour, trellises, trees, orchard maintenance equipment, fuel and even the bins to put apples in, everything is going up. We are competing with exports from other countries and with states like Washington that put downward pressure on our prices. Oftentimes, those countries see less pressure in their costs of production than we face in Canada, and many of them are well supported by their government in the work they do.

I encourage all of you to keep fighting on behalf of farmers so that we can continue to compete. I appreciate the work all of you do on this committee to support growers and farmers in our sector. I appreciate your time today and I thank you very much for the invitation to speak.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I know that our chair sponsored Bill C-359 to address “provisional registration and approval” to ensure timely access to things like feed, seed and product. I certainly endorsed it as a co-signer with him. It is frustrating as a parliamentarian to see how slowly the bureaucratic process works sometimes. It's frustrating when you see things being utilized in the United States or Europe and we can't access them here for what could be two years.

Are there any examples that you could provide to us of those impediments?

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

We'll let the 20 seconds come back to the chair.

No, Mr. Steinley, that's okay. I want to take a chance with our good officials.

Ms. Beck, I want to start with Bill C-359. This is a private member's bill that I introduced that would amend the seeds, feeds and pest control acts to try to allow for foreign decisions of trusted jurisdiction. We leave that definition open for the agencies themselves to delineate who would be a trusted organization.

It reflects what I heard over the past four years, as a member of Parliament, from the Canadian agriculture industry. It says it wants to make sure it has access to the same tools that our competitors have in other jurisdictions around the world, particularly where there has already been scientific review that would be robust, similar to that done by our own Canadian agencies.

Has the department looked at the proposed legislation? Do you have any opinion or thoughts initially that you can share with me and this committee?

[Janice Tranberg, President and Chief Executive Officer, National Cattle Feeders' Association]

Our second ask is that the government foster a business environment that supports Canadian agriculture through regulatory, policy and taxation requirements that track alongside those of our international competitors. While the Canadian government cannot control global events, they can control the regulatory, policy and taxation burdens on Canadian farmers. The total cost resulting from the government piling on requirements for farmers is a catalyst for inflation and a threat to food security.

Now is the time for the government to commit to agile and competitive government policy that contributes to the profitability of farmers, to food security and to environmental sustainability.

There are many simple, non-monetary regulatory and policy changes that could have a significant impact on our sector: for example, creating an automatic exemption from the underused housing tax for farmers who own homes for the purpose of housing farm workers, as well as ensuring an efficient and timely approval process for new and innovative products that are available to our global competitors. This is supported by MP Kody Blois, who has a recent private member's bill, Bill C-359.

Another example is aligning Canada and the United States on specified risk material regulations, as well as addressing the economic and animal welfare challenges of electronic logging devices for livestock transportation, setting achievable targets within the sustainable agriculture strategy that track alongside our global competitors, and approving the desperately needed grasshopper control product lambda-cyhalothrin for livestock feed in Canada.

These are just some examples. As today permits, we stand ready to talk as well about additional recommendations that were included in the NCFA's written submission to the committee, including funding support for the Canadian integrated program for anti-microbial resistance surveillance and maintaining the interest-free portion of the advance payments program at the current level of $350,000.

NCFA thanks you for your consideration today.

Feeds Act

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-359, An Act to amend the Feeds Act, the Seeds Act and the Pest Control Products Act (provisional registration and approval).

Mr. Speaker, it is great to be up again to introduce this private member's bill. As you mentioned, the title of the bill is an act to amend the Feeds Act, the Seeds Act and the Pest Control Products Act on provisional registration and approval.

I have had the opportunity in this House, over the last six to eight months, to talk about the ways that we could drive competitiveness in the agricultural sector. If members talk to farmers across the country, farmers will talk about the important tools, whether they be new seeds, new feeds or crop protection products, and how we could find ways to leverage the science and trusted jurisdictions elsewhere as part of the regulatory process.

The legislation proposes a 90-day provisional registration, where an applicant arriving at Health Canada, CFIA or PMRA would be able to show the science of jurisdictions elsewhere in the world where there is approval. It would allow those regulatory agencies to define what a trusted jurisdiction is. It would allow for provisional registration to ensure farmers have access to these tools in a more timely manner, without compromising public safety or the scientific process that we expect our Canadian regulators to undertake.

For the regulatory model that would follow, I envision a moment where there could be a pause on the provisional registration if necessary. However, this bill is supported by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture and a variety of stakeholders groups across the country.

I would encourage any member of the House to second it. I would encourage any member to perhaps take their name to it if they are higher up on the bid. I will be calling on the government to introduce this legislation in budget 2024.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)