Agriculture Committee on Nov. 29th, 2012

[Paul Mayers]

Thank you very much.

Should we do better? Absolutely, and I think Bill S-11, the Safe Food for Canadians Act, represents an opportunity for continuous improvement in the system.

Does that mean that the system failed? No, I don't believe the system failed. With respect to XL Foods, the fact that this contaminated product was identified prior to any report of an illness is a demonstration of what we want in the system. We want to be able to move proactively in situations where Canadians may be exposed to contaminated food.

We recognize that as a raw product, meat will occasionally have bacteria. What we want is to minimize illness. In this situation, we recognize that the system was not perfect, because, as you note, some illnesses did occur. The fact that the system recognized there was contaminated product before any illness was identified and acted on it with a preventative, proactive recall before the illnesses emerged minimized the potential for broad expansion of harmful effects.

I am not going to ever suggest that we will achieve absolute perfection in preventing contaminated product from occurring. That is impossible for us to provide as an assurance. In fact, it is impossible for any regulatory institution in the world. None of my regulatory colleagues in any country would say that their system can provide that absolute assurance for raw product.

What we strive to do is minimize those occurrences. When they do occur, we take rapid action to minimize the exposure of consumers. We also make adjustments with regulated parties. We also administer consequences. The consequence for XL was significant: we suspended all of their operations because we couldn't get the proper assurances at the time. We then worked with them to build our assurance that they were indeed operating effectively and safely. We have since allowed them to return to the marketplace. That's the hallmark of an effective system, in my mind: it recognizes problems, it acts on them, and then it seeks a return to compliance as quickly as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Mr. Richards is next.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I hate to be the one always trying to focus on the topic at hand here, but I will be doing that. I have about three different questions on the supplementary estimates (B) that I'd like to ask, and I hope we can get to all three.

One of the things in the supplementary estimates (B) was $600,000 for funding to support Canada’s participation in international organizations in the areas of agriculture, agrifood, agribased products, and agri-environment. I believe that sounds like good news for farmers. It will help to raise the profile for Canadian food exports.

I would like to hear a little bit more from you about how you think those moneys might be able to help raise the profile for agriculture exporters. Maybe you could comment on how important those foreign markets are for our farmers and our processors.

[Rita Moritz, Assistant Deputy Minister, Farm Financial Programs Branch, Department of Agriculture and Agri-Food]

That line item is as you mentioned, Mr. Richards. It is to allow us to participate internationally in a number of fora. Some examples would be the International Grains Council, which deals in trade in wheat, maize, and rice. It is important for us to be at those tables. There is also the International Agriculture Trade Research Consortium. CABI deals with agricultural biosciences, institutes of food security, biodiversity, and supporting farmers. There are a number of other organizations, such as the FAO, in which we participate. We feel it's important that we as a country be at those tables to participate in these discussions.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Thank you. I appreciate that very much.

I'll move to the next item that I wanted to ask about.

I see that there is also included for CFIA, in their supplementary estimates, a transfer from National Defence of $276,000 for what's billed as the Canadian safety and security program. I wonder if you could just explain that one to the committee and tell us exactly what that money is going to be used for and how it falls within your mandate.

[Peter Everson]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

To expand on my earlier comments, the fascinating thing about this is that the equipment we are purchasing will allow us to much more rapidly characterize the DNA of food pathogens. Obviously it serves our own program interests, of course, but in the event of a national emergency, we can support our other stakeholders in their response as well. That's why DND funds this type of investment, both in governmental partners and non-governmental partners as well.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

I also wanted to ask this question.

I spent a number of years on a hog farm. That's where I grew up and where I spent a few years of my adult life as well. I see in the supplementary estimates that just over $6 million has been earmarked there for what's billed as “Funding for biosecurity, research, and long-term risk management solutions that will contribute to the prosperity and stability of the sector (Initiative for the Control of Diseases in the Hog Industry)”.

I know as a government we have made some pretty significant investments in the hog sector. It's something that I know, in talking to the pork producers, they're quite happy about. I wonder if you could tell me a little bit about this particular investment and how it will be beneficial to the hog sector.

[Rita Moritz]

Perhaps again, Mr. Chair, I can start, and if there are further questions from the financial side, I'll pass it to my colleague and CFO.

This is money that we are asking to reprofile, and it's to support the Canadian Swine Health Board. This board was created as part of the control of diseases in the hog industry initiative, which started a while back. It is very much for what we call phase two. The first phase was for an inoculation for the circovirus, which was an issue at the time, and to implement that as an ongoing safety practice within herds of hogs.

The second part was really to establish a biosecurity standard and to roll that biosecurity standard out in the industry, so this is the remainder of the second phase that we are working through with the Canadian Swine Health Board. That was unspent money that we are moving forward to continue to spend with the money that we had this fiscal year.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Ms. Brosseau is next.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I would like to thank all the guests. Honestly, I wish we could do this more often and have this kind of question-and-answer approach, because we know it's important in how we do our work. I could say that when I got up in the House and asked questions concerning XL Foods, I wasn't doing that to get points; I was doing it because these were honest questions, and I knew my constituents were curious. I didn't do it to hurt anybody. It was just to get clarity on the issue.

When we're speaking of the budget, the PBO announced, I think in October, that federal spending was going to be 20% lower in 2012-13. I know we're modernizing. I know we're changing the way we do things. Were there any reports or was any analysis done before these reductions?

[Peter Everson]

Perhaps I can answer the question here and I'll turn to my colleagues for details, of course.

The analysis responding to the budget, of course, was very detailed. It was well in advance of the budget. We led up to it by looking at all sorts of different proposals and to challenging every one.

Central to our approach was that there would be no reduction in food safety to Canadians, so we focused primarily on the area of administrative efficiencies, or in other areas such as the return of inspection to provinces and changing how we approach inspection in non-food safety areas.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

I have a quick question. How many meat inspectors do we have?

[Barbara Jordan]

I'll get that number for you; I have it right here.

We have, as of March of this year, 1,733 meat inspectors.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

We have 1,733. How does that compare to previous years?

[Barbara Jordan]

That is a year-over-year increase from 1,697.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

In title, you could be a meat inspector, but are you actually on the floor inspecting meat? I don't know what the definition of meat inspector would be. Are they actually on the floor? Is it somebody working in an office? What is a meat inspector?

[Barbara Jordan]

These are what we call front-line staff.

You're quite right. Inspection activity is a continuum. We do have folks who work in labs who are considered to be inspection staff as well. There are other folks who have more office-type jobs, who are considered inspection staff, because their work is critical in supporting the work of what we call our front-line inspectors, but the numbers I've given you are the front-line staff, so they're in establishments.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Okay.

I know we had somebody come to the committee recently, and the issue of meat tenderizers and labelling came up. I was wondering if that was something that was still floating around. Is that going to come to light? Is that going to be something that the government pushes for—the labelling of meat that has been tenderized?

[Paul Mayers]

Thank you very much.

Issues of the safety standard and defining the safety standard fall to our colleagues at Health Canada, who establish the food safety standards in Canada. As it relates to the tenderizing of meat, Health Canada has written to the meat industry indicating that it is looking at this issue and that it will undertake work in terms of assessing risk in this regard. While it does that work, it has encouraged the industry to consider identifying products in the marketplace so that consumers can differentiate between an intact product and a product that has been tenderized.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

So it's still in the works.

[Paul Mayers]

That work will continue.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Okay. It's ongoing.

How many CIFA employees actually receive proper training on CVS?

[Barbara Jordan]

We have an extensive training program for our inspectors and we continue to invest in training for our inspectors. We received funding to do that from a recent budget, along with other funds for inspection modernization activities, so there will be a very significant training program as part of that going forward.

At the moment, there is some information in the public domain questioning the number of inspectors who have received training on CVS. The clarification I would like to bring to that is that not all inspectors who are in a meat plant perform CVS tasks. Inspectors who have that responsibility in a meat plant environment are trained on CVS.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Do you know how many are trained?

[Barbara Jordan]

I can certainly get a number.