Agriculture Committee on April 4th, 2012

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you very much. Your time is up.

Ms. Raynault, you have five minutes.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for accepting the committee's invitation.

Mr. Nault, Mr. Busque, as I have been involved in agricultural production—including cucumber production for a Quebec-based company I will not name—I can tell you that, in 1985, we already knew there would be no more local production. That was later confirmed in Lanaudière. I would like local production to make a comeback because it would provide young people with summer jobs.

In your paper titled “Chaîne agroalimentaire: un défi pour les citoyens”, agri-food chain: a Canadian challenge, you say that, in our cities, food self-sufficiency would make it possible to survive for only two weeks. That is worrisome. How can the situation be remedied? Should we start with provisions right away?

[André Nault]

It is all a matter of dependence. In rural areas where farming is more developed and people are in direct contact with a producer who provides beef or various other products, they will be able to survive a while longer. However, in cities—and I am thinking of the situation in Sherbrooke, which has some 15 superstores—if disaster struck, stores would be empty in three days, and homes two weeks later.

In the area of public safety, people are being educated and encouraged to be self-sufficient for a two-week period, as far as water and food go. We don't know what can happen. In 1998, the ice storm went on for 28 days, in some cases. Therefore, a certain level of food self-sufficiency is necessary. Food dependence was created when we started to rely on foreign markets. I think that is the root of the problem. Things would be different if we produced our food and imported our surplus. The surplus has become essential. In these conditions, if I need a banana on a daily basis, there is a problem with the local agriculture, which has failed to provide a product that could replace the banana.

I am not against people eating a banana once a week or once a month. I have nothing against imported products, but they should not take the place of our local products. However, since 1980, imported products have slowly been replacing our local ones.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

What you are saying is exactly right. Monoculture led to a famine in Ireland in 1822. Locally, there are fewer diversified crops; we have only one or two kinds of corn, one kind of tomato, and so on. How can we convince producers to grow several kinds of tomatoes?

[André Nault]

That is why public markets and solidarity markets are important. Our markets provide great variety. People can buy a type of carrot called the “crotte”. They can buy a blue potato whose name escapes me. Do you understand? We have a great variety of products available. Our local producers are slowly bringing back older strains of produce. I think people are being educated. You can buy turnips, black radish, and so on. That kind of produce had disappeared from our diets. Almost 147 kinds of corn were being produced in 1893. In 1983, that number had dropped to barely 17. I am not sure how many there are today.

As standardization increases, so do major consequences that make us more vulnerable to a food crisis. That is because our food production lacks balance. Exportation does not inhibit variety and diversity. However, if producing a single kind of produce is easier, that is the kind that will be produced.

When potato variety dropped to only four different kinds, a disease developed that resulted in a famine. Nearly one million people died of hunger.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

So they immigrated to Quebec.

[André Nault]

Some of them immigrated to Quebec. Those who did not die immigrated.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Do I have any time left?

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

You still have a little time if you'd like.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Of course, I would prefer our farmers to have a diversified production—as you just said—of fruits and vegetables, in order to ensure their revenue.

[André Nault]

That is what sells, whether we are talking about small- or large-scale agriculture. I think we'll have two systems that will become distinct in time. Those systems should not be contaminated. That is all I'll say on the topic.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Very well, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Lemieux, for five minutes.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here. First of all, I want to ask a question about farmers' markets. I have four of them in my riding.

[Robert Chorney]

And some good ones.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Yes, some good ones, and they've been there a long time. They're smaller markets. In the larger city centres, even though they're farmers' markets, they turn into big businesses, in a sense. When you look at the farmers' market, for example, here in Ottawa, you have to buy the stall. It's big money to buy the stall. You have to have a permit. Your stall has to measure such and such. There are all sorts of regulations. It's not like a farmers' market in my riding, meaning that if I go to Vankleek Hill, it's just not regulated like that and it's not the big money. In fact, farmers are encouraged to come and just sell their produce.

I'm wondering if you could share with us the impact of what I consider to be major differences between big centre farmers' markets and small, rural farmers' markets.

[Robert Chorney]

I think it's all relative, a matter of scale. Here in Ottawa the city passed the bylaw two or three years ago. It was just a free-for-all up until two or three years ago. Now they have different classifications of vendors, so there are some real farmers there now. If a huckster is a huckster, a huckster is identified as a huckster.

Certainly they all pay stall fees. Somebody has to pay the freight in terms of the expenses to run a market. Over at Vankleek Hill, for example, I suspect a farmer probably pays $20 a day to be at the market, but they have to raise funds to pay for their advertising. They have an insurance premium they have to pay, and membership in Farmers' Markets Ontario, which is not onerous.

But the big markets have probably tighter rules because a lot of funny stuff over the years has happened at the ByWard Market in Ottawa. I couldn't even begin to tell you the horror stories, but in the smaller markets it's more a sense of family. You don't get that at the ByWard Market, and I'm not down-speaking that market, but if you go to Vankleek Hill, it's a nice big family. Some of the folks there help do that market. It's just a nice family.

Yes, there are rules and regulations, certainly, in almost all the markets. Some are tougher than others, and they probably should be.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Looking at the supply chain—because that's what we're looking at here—and how farmers' markets fall into that, some of the farmers at farmers' markets, particularly in rural communities, which I know more of...sometimes it's a small producer, a hobby farm type of set-up, and they are selling their product at a farmers' market, but I don't think they're really able to live off that—maybe so on the ByWard Market where there's a lot more pedestrian traffic. In the smaller communities, although there might be good commerce, I don't think there's enough for anyone to live off. So I would imagine that some of the other farmers there have other commercial operations under way to sell their produce, or they are feeding into a local food chain, meaning they're supplying local grocery stores or perhaps even larger distributors.

I'm wondering if you could comment on the different supply chains, just from your experience in travelling around the country. When you start getting into the rural communities, how do you see the balance between the person at the table...? Is it a small hobby farm or is it a committed farmer who's earning his livelihood, a small portion of which comes from the farmers' market and a greater portion from the larger food system in Canada?

[Robert Chorney]

I think you're bang on. A lot of the vendors one sees at a farmers' market—not here in Ottawa or Toronto's St. Lawrence—are part-time farmers. They hold day jobs and they're tilling the soil nicely on weekends and bringing their product to market. The larger farmer—I think of Bert Andrews at Milton, for example, who sells at ten farmers' markets, but he has Mexicans working in the fields; he has staff he's trained. He goes to ten markets in one week.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Are they small, rural markets or are some of them the larger, urban markets?

[Robert Chorney]

He does two or three. He does one in Milton and two or three in Toronto, Georgetown, Orangeville.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Does he earn his living solely from farmers' markets, or does he feed into the larger chain?

[Robert Chorney]

He's a big retail operator. He has a farm-gate business. Absolutely, his sales are in the millions.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

From farmers' markets or from farmers' markets and other—

[Robert Chorney]

He's selling at the farm gate.