Agriculture Committee on May 8th, 2007

[Bob Friesen]

You mean if we export into another country?

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

I'm concerned about the Canadian government policy that allows products into our country, when the producers of those products did not have to follow the rules that our farmers have to follow.

[Bob Friesen]

Part of the problem there is that we've been told by CFIA that unless we have mandatory on-farm food safety programs, we cannot set standards at the border. That's why we're advocating doing it through communication and doing it through branding Canada in Canada and making our consumers aware of what Canadian farmers do in the production of food.

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Will that offset price competitiveness in the grocery store for some bioproduct that's coming in that looks like cheese?

[Bob Friesen]

We do have information that Canadian consumers are prepared to pay a premium if they know the money is going to farmers, but unless we make our on-farm food safety programs mandatory, again, we can't control it at the border. The only thing we could do is adopt a precautionary approach, but again that has to be a science-based precautionary approach.

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

When we--

[Richard Phillips]

May I just say one quick word, Ken?

Following up on the branding, I was actually surprised that Ontario doesn't seem to be quite as well developed as Manitoba, where we have a very successful Peak of the Market program. If you go into the grocery stores and you look at a bag of potatoes or a bag of carrots, you know they are produced in Manitoba and weren't repackaged in Manitoba. They are actually produced by Manitoba producers. I know, just from our own family's perspective, that we're willing to pay.... A lot of times it is competitively priced, but even if it's a little bit more, people need to know that they are supporting the farmer when they buy that product. So it can happen, but it takes the producers and the processors working together to make sure that Canadian product is on the shelves.

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

In terms of our own regional aspects, one thing is the research stations you see scattered throughout the country that are developing things that can be done in local areas. Really, you can't take Atlantic Canada's research and apply it to Saskatchewan.

I need to hear your views and opinion on the funding for these localized, regional research stations, because right now we have this wonder solution, that ethanol or the biofuels are going to do all these things for us, and we're already seeing some other ramifications. I'm just wondering how you see, from field to market, the evolution of all those steps as a part of our national policy.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. To wanted to get in on the last question, so I'll let you take that question, plus you can kick off first on this round.

[Justin To]

On the previous question, I think you're right, and our producers are also saying that. They want to have equivalent standards when they're competing, because they compete globally against global producers.

The reality is that different countries and unions, such as the European Union, have different standards, and people have different ideas of what is important to them as to what they want in their foods. You're going to have different rules among standards across the world. I think that's just the reality.

The key part of that is the recognition that if we have different standards here in Canada, it's because we as a people have decided they should be different. But the reality is also that our producers compete globally, so how do we ensure that our producers are not competing on that global scale with their hands tied behind their backs, faced with those different standards?

That is also a recognition that maybe we need to help producers cover costs for food safety and environment programs, but also help them with domestic labelling and other issues like that.

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Here's one very quick question.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Okay, be very quick.

[Ken Boshcoff, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

If we branded “Canadian standard” as the ultimate in security, nutrition, and the highest safety levels, could that raise the bar for everybody else, so that people actually sought out the Canadian product?

[Bob Friesen]

The one thing we are discouraging, and I had this discussion at an IFAD meeting a couple of weeks ago, is any suggestion that you should try to compete based on saying “My food is safer than your food”, because we think that any food on a shelf should be safe. By virtue of the fact that it's there, it should be safe.

What we're saying is, let's simply communicate our high production standards, our environmental standards, and food safety standards, and then brand Canada in Canada and do it that way. Also, let's advertise that these are Canadian farmers who are producing it.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you, Mr. Boshcoff.

Mr. Friesen, let me just follow up with you on that. Whose responsibility is it to brand “Canadian”? Is it the producers', the industry's, the distributors', or do you want it to be the government's?

[Bob Friesen]

I'll ask Justin to answer that. He's been doing the work on this project.

[Justin To]

It's been varied. If you want to get into a philosophical discussion of who should, that's another question. But certain of the provincial governments have very strong programs--there's Foodland Ontario, and there is the example from Manitoba given by Richard Phillips.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

The Manitoba example is privately done.

[Justin To]

Right.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

The marketing is done by producers themselves.

[Justin To]

There are other private labels as well. In Europe—in England, for instance—they have a brown tractor promoting European-grown foods. And national governments have taken that on.

It's tough to say. We're certainly not suggesting it should solely be government's role. I think industry wants to take a role. We would like to take a role in being a partner in it and funding parts of it. We see it as a partnership between government and industry making it a success.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thanks, Mr. To.

Bob, you also said you have data indicating that consumers are willing to pay more for homegrown products. Do you have that data? Would you be able to provide it to the committee?

[Bob Friesen]

We have some really good information on that already, just in the initial stages of this research. We'd absolutely be willing to provide it to you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Anderson, you're up next.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Okay. I think I'll be splitting my time with my colleague.