Agriculture Committee on Feb. 14th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

I call the meeting to order.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food, meeting number 67. In accordance with the orders of the day, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we are continuing our study of the agricultural and agri-food products supply chain, the grains and oilseeds segment.

Joining us today from the heart of Canada, the Brandon—Souris constituency, we have Cal Vandaele, who is the president of Vandaele Seeds Ltd., and David Rourke, who is a director, Western Feed Grain Development Co-op Ltd.

Welcome. Can you all hear us clearly? All right.

I'll ask you, as you were briefed, to give a brief presentation and then we'll move to questions from the committee.

David, do you want to start?

[David Rourke, Director, Western Feed Grain Development Co-op Ltd.]

Sure, I can start.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and MPs. Hello, and thank you for the invitation to speak to you today.

My name is David Rourke, and I'm a farmer from Minto, Manitoba. I obtained a B.Sc. and a master' s degree from the University of Manitoba. I've been married to my wife Diane for 36 years, and we have four kids and five grandkids. We started farming in 1980 and now run a 5,300-acre grain farm with our son Donald. We used to finish about 15,000 pigs per year, but currently operate a 600-head goat dairy.

I am also an agriculture research scientist. I founded Ag-Quest, Inc., in 1983. Ag-Quest is a contract research company, with four research stations across western Canada. My daughter Dana is in the process of taking over Ag-Quest from me.

I also founded what we call the Western Feed Grain Development Co-op Ltd., which is a farmer-owned, wheat-breeding cooperative formed to develop general purpose wheat varieties for western Canada, although we are interested in expanding that mandate.

I did send out a brief, but I discovered last night that it was a bit long, so I'm going to skip some of the portions.

I'm here today to promote support for a significant farmer-owned, plant-breeding initiative. I believe the best time to have started a farmer-controlled, plant-breeding resource was probably 25 years ago, but the next-best time is now.

With the changes that Minister Ritz has started with the Wheat Board and the registration system—namely, the elimination of KVD and the establishment of the general purpose class—along with the job and program cuts that have occurred at AAFC and the Canada Grains Council, there exists an opportunity for farmer-owned, plant-breeding organizations to be established. With what I believe to be the further demise of public plant breeding, we believe we need at least one progressive farmer-owned, plant-breeding organization to ensure competition in the seed business.

Please don't misunderstand. I'm not against what the multinational companies and other private breeding companies either have done or can do, especially regarding innovation and developing novel traits and improved genetics. We need innovation from all sectors to supply the world with feed and food stocks. I also don't see anything wrong with the multinationals getting as high a return on their investment as they can from the marketplace. They have responsibilities to their shareholders to do just that.

However, I, like other farmers, have a responsibility to my shareholders. Those are my wife, my kids, and my grandkids. For that reason, I want to have an alternative in the seed supply business to ensure that I and other farmers are not paying too much.

I have two recent examples of farmers paying too much. If there were a farmer-owned alternative, I think prices would be more in line with the cost of production, and my shareholders would be getting a more stable return.

The first example is nitrogen fertilizer. In the fall, the price for anhydrous ammonia was $1,000 a tonne. With natural gas at an almost all-time low, at about $2.50 per unit, the cost of production of anhydrous ammonia is estimated to be less than $200 a tonne, so that's an $800 per tonne spread. If farmers could and should own their own nitrogen production capabilities, they could move that profit back to their own pockets. There are at least three farm-led initiatives to help bring balance back into that fertilizer market.

A second example is with canola seed. In 1980 canola seed was probably about $1.50 a pound, if you adjusted to 2012 dollars. However, in 2013 it's now $11 a pound. Although there are certainly improvements in genetics and the technologies that we have, that's a 6.7-fold increase in the price of seed. I think this handsomely allows the plant-breeding companies to recapture a return on their investment, but it also costs farmers quite a lot of money.

Yes, there are improvements that require a return on investment to the technology providers, but there are a couple of realities in the canola industry. We believe the return on investment to farmers from canola is actually declining and the risk on returns is getting quite high. In other words, canola is very expensive to grow, and only if everything goes great all season and you have an above-average yield do you make any money with canola. As a result of this higher risk, plus increased plant diseases, canola acres are starting to decline.

Further, some of the old new technologies such as the Roundup Ready gene in soybean, are now off patent, but with evergreening of patents, prosecution threats, fear of intimidation, and fear of prosecution in an environment where questions about access to the technologies have not or don't seem to be answered, no one is taking advantage of the off-patent technologies to help ensure competition in the seed business.

Now I come to the crux. My requests today are for the consideration of the following points.

The first is that the federal government restore a vigorous, publicly funded plant breeding initiative in Canada.

Second, if that's not possible, even with check-off and cost-share assistance, then make those facilities, programs, and germplasms available to farmer-owned plant-breeding organizations on a preferred basis over multinationals to ensure that farmers in Canada have competitive alternatives in the future.

Third, while we need to look ahead to develop new traits for superior field performance and economic advantage, we also need to have the opportunity to further access old traits associated with these old new technologies that are now off patent or will be coming off patent. We need a clear path forward to use those traits in breeding programs without legal uncertainty about freedom to operate.

Fourth, we need a robust effort from the multinationals to develop new traits and germplasms for affordable solutions to feeding an ever-increasing population. I think there's room for all.

Fifth is something very concrete. We would like to see the Winnipeg AAFC Canadian prairie spring wheat program, which currently has no breeder because of retirement and is not likely to be refilled because of job cuts, be the first program to be turned over to a farmer-based plant-breeding company. The Western Feed Grain Development Co-op Ltd. is the only farmer-owned wheat-breeding organization in western Canada at the present time. It is our hope that as we move forward, every farmer in Western Canada will take the opportunity and responsibility to become an owner of what we see as a larger and larger farmer-owned plant-breeding company.

Sixth, we've asked that the government promote that a significant portion of the new wheat and barley check-offs go to farmer-owned plant-breeding initiatives.

I would also like to list some of the reasons I know that a farmer-owned plant-breeding company can provide effective competition.

The first is that we have actually run a small farmer-owned plant-breeding company, WFGD, with 80 members for the last seven years.

We will be putting a general purpose wheat variety forward to the registration committee in February and expect to receive registration. It ranks third in yield in the southern Manitoba zone, which is where we bred it for; it has above-average fusarium head blight control; and it meets or exceeds the minimum requirements of all diseases.

I must also point out that there are three very good checks that we have to compete against, and we're out-yielding them all. One of them is a soft white wheat developed in Alberta that is a very high-yielding wheat. One of them is a CPS wheat from Syngenta, one of the multinationals, and the third is a German wheat that was put in the program in the general purpose class. We actually have out-yielded them all, so we're quite proud of that, and we've done it with a very modest budget and using only traditional techniques. We moved this variety from its initial cross in 2005 to the registration process in just over seven years.

Second, even within some of the biggest companies, traditional methods of using intensive nurseries with vigorous selections result in new marketable traits. Therefore, not all new traits will be the result of GMO technologies and would not have the same development costs as GMO technologies.

The third reason is that in our experience, farmer-owned organizations get good cooperation and germplasm exchange from around the world. We work with CIMMYT and many other organizations to get new parents in our program.

Fourth, new initiatives in Manitoba, such as the proposed plant innovations centre in Winnipeg, as well as university programs from other provinces will be complementary to farmer-owned breeding initiatives.

Fifth, farmers are beginning to recognize that in order to protect their future and the return on investment for their shareholders and families, they must be proactive.

Sixth, innovative agronomic work, as well as new technologies, are more available today than ever before. While many of these new technologies will be controlled by multinationals, there are some from public institutions that will available under licence.

Seventh, innovation is often in the hands of the visionary and certainly is not exclusive to large companies.

Eighth, I believe that it is in the government’s interest to make sure the remnants of publicly funded programs that are being disbanded or terminated are disposed of in a way that creates the most benefit to the most people, in this case starting with farmers who will most directly benefit from the results of these plant-breeding initiatives.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thanks, David.

Cal, please go ahead.

[Cal Vandaele, President, Vandaele Seeds Ltd.]

Good morning.

I'd like to personally thank Mr. Merv Tweed and his staff for the invitation and the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food for the opportunity to present today.

My name is Cal Vandaele. I'm a co-owner of Vandaele Seeds in Medora, Manitoba. Our family business is active in the purchasing, processing, and exporting of cereals, oilseeds, and pulse crops. In addition to the seed- and grain-cleaning operations, we also have our own trucking company, Vandaele Logistics, which services our own customers and also does custom hauling. We also operate a 10,000-acre grain farm. We currently employ 40 full-time and four part-time employees in addition to our family members.

In relation to the supply chain for grains and oilseeds, I'd like to present three main areas of concern, or three subjects, to you today. One of them is a concern that's more related to our company, and two of them I believe are becoming bigger industry issues.

On the first subject, our business is located just a few kilometres from the U.S. border. Up until about two years ago, we were able to transport export shipments to the western U.S.A. through the closest border crossing. In particular, that's the Westhope, North Dakota, or Coulter, Manitoba, crossing located on Highway 83.

We recently had the renewal of our permits denied by U.S. customs, as our shipments through this local crossing were not considered local deliveries. This has resulted in our having to reroute truck traffic to the port of Dunseith or the Boissevain, Manitoba, crossing. The other option is to move over to the Portal, North Dakota, or North Portal, Saskatchewan, crossing, which results in a lot of extra kilometres per trip and excessive trucking costs.

During load restriction season, which is coming up, it is even worse, as the trucks have to travel much further south before moving back north, only to turn around and head south again, all in an attempt to find unrestricted highways. We also cannot find an acceptable route within Canada, again due to extra mileage and road restrictions in season.

If we could have the privilege of using the port of Westhope or Coulter, Manitoba, it would result in the savings of thousands of dollars and provide our drivers with more hours in their logbooks, resulting in higher productivity.

Highway 83 is a major trade corridor, an unrestricted highway running from Manitoba to Texas, yet we are hamstrung by a local border crossing with limited hours of service and no ability to put commercial truck traffic through that port, although the oil industry is using that port regularly.

In addition to that, there is a relatively new intermodal and ocean container service available at Minot, North Dakota. There is a good supply of empty ocean containers available at the facility, containers that have brought oil field supplies in and are being used to export grains and oilseeds back out, primarily from North Dakota companies.

Our company has been strongly considering the use of this terminal for two reasons. The first one is that the ocean freight rates from the terminal in Minot to overseas terminals are quite competitive. The second reason is that the terminal in Minot is only 150 kilometres from our business, as compared with our nearest Canadian terminal at Winnipeg, which is 330 kilometres.

Obviously this can be a huge savings or business advantage, but we have the same problem with using the terminal at Minot, the issue again being the port of Westhope, North Dakota, or Coulter, Manitoba. We can only bring empty ocean containers back through the Canadian crossing; once the container is loaded at our plant and has to go back to the terminal at Minot, it has to be rerouted over through Dunseith, North Dakota, or to Portal, again resulting in a lot of extra truck traffic and costs.

I believe that in the best interests of economic development—not just agriculture, but economic development in general in western Manitoba—it would be beneficial to explore the idea of transforming the Westhope-Coulter border crossing into a commercial port.

The second subject is this. Our company has been very active in the processing and exporting of flaxseed to Europe for many years. When a GMO event, CDC Triffid, was discovered in Canadian flax shipments a few years ago, it brought that line of business to a grinding halt.

The acceptable level for GMO in Europe is essentially zero, although there is an extremely small tolerance, as the labs cannot test to exactly zero. Zero is an unforgiving number, and nearly unobtainable for any exporter.

The Canadian flax industry has suffered a serious setback since the Triffid event. Normal trade has not yet been restored, and perhaps never will be, as eastern European production has taken Canada's place.

GMO crops are everywhere in our supply chain system, and we believe that moving to a low-level presence system is absolutely necessary. Even the most stringent Identity Preserved programs and testing programs, such as the certified container sampling program introduced by the Canadian Grain Commission, can't mitigate the risk and the liability involved.

Our company has worked diligently to bring back our European flax business with a small degree of success by using the Canadian Grain Commission certified container sampling program. I believe the government plays an important role in negotiating policy on low-level presence for the future.

Number three, my final subject, is availability of employees and labour to the agriculture industry. As the baby boomers ease into retirement, I believe this is one of the biggest issues facing our industry. Nearly every business owner or farmer I talk to is indicating that this is their biggest challenge right now. Even the most efficient business models and supply chains don't run themselves. It takes quality people to run every business and every organization.

I consider our family business to be very fortunate to have such a fine staff. However, as our business continues to grow and requires more staff, we find it increasingly difficult to recruit people, especially in rural areas with low populations. We've had some great people join our staff from overseas and we believe that recruiting more people from these countries will be required. However, in saying that, we find the LMO process, the labour market opinion process with Service Canada, to be very time-consuming and not very user-friendly. As a small company, we don't have the resources to spend as much time on this as is required, and I suspect that most small business owners would agree.

I'm unaware if such a thing exists or not, but I would like to see recruiting agencies specific to smaller agribusiness, to help seek out quality people and assist in getting them to work in western Canadian agribusiness. This would include taking business owners to these countries on labour missions to help set up interviews and assist with the LMO process with Service Canada and help get immigrants settled in Canada, including details such as health care, driver's licences, day care, housing, etc.

In closing, I'd like to make a personal comment. In my personal opinion, the move to a dual market for wheat and barley has been one of the single biggest advances for farmers of my generation. I believe that it will ultimately prove to be a very positive change and give young farmers the choice in marketing that has been long overdue. As I suspected, the flow of grain has not really changed, and my neighbours are not lined up at North Dakota elevators to sell their wheat. They are marketing at home, with price transparency and freedom to make their own choices in a supply and demand market. I commend Mr. Ritz for his perseverance on the issue.

Thank you kindly for your time and the opportunity to speak.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you very much.

We'll open questions with Mr. Allen.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Thanks very much, Chair.

Thank you to both of you for being with us today. The chair loves to tell us how wonderful Brandon is, and let me say, as somebody who lives in southern Ontario, I don't necessarily disagree with him. I've had the pleasure of being out there. It is a wonderful place.

Mr. Vandaele, if I could start with you, sir, at the tail end you talked about labour issues and labour shortages. In Niagara where I am, we face similar issues in the agriculture sector. We have a different type of sector than you, obviously. We have 38 wineries and obviously we have a number of vineyards and tender fruit crops and those sorts of things, but we have a similar issue.

There are variations from province to province to a certain degree around resettlement issues, and if I heard you correctly at the end, I think what you were talking about, if we go overseas to recruit... I think it's an interesting idea, what you're talking about—that we'd do it in a collective way with farmers and small agribusinesses.

Are we talking about bringing workers in who are then on a path to a landed immigrant process or a citizenship process, or are we simply talking about temporary foreign workers?

Where were you going with that? I wasn't quite sure.

[Cal Vandaele]

Yes, thank you.

I see us being on a path to citizenship for these people. We currently have four employees who have come from Ireland and England, all of whom are serious about staying in Canada and building a future here. Some of them already have their permanent residency. This is not about short-term fixes. We're looking at the long term. We're looking at bringing quality people to our communities and making a future for them within the community and within our business.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

To be fair, sir, I thought that's where you were headed. I appreciate those thoughts, because I think that is a progressive way to look at farm labour, in the sense that if we're going offshore to get it, and indeed they choose the path to citizenship—this is an individual choice for those folks who want to come—then why not, if that's what they want? I applaud you on your efforts to do that, and of course, on hiring somebody from Ireland. My father actually came from Belfast. I actually came from Scotland, so it's kind of a mixed group.

Mr. Rourke, you talked about a number of different things. One of them was what one might describe as the public good, in the sense of how we do public investment that then becomes utilized by all folks who wish to take it up. Do you see a need for us to be doing more of that? If we're not doing more of that, you started to outline where you thought individual farmers or cooperative groups might take it on.

Could you help us understand a little bit better what that should be, beyond just that we should do more public research? I agree with that, by the way. What would you see if that weren't happening? How could we help cooperatives like yours do that type of work that becomes the public good?

[David Rourke]

I've thought about that a little bit, but probably I don't have the definitive answer.

I know that if farmers have too much control and food becomes scarce and we export our food out of the country and our own families and our own citizens are either paying too much for food or not getting what they want, there will be some kind of backlash. I think keeping us competitive and keeping food relatively inexpensive is how you justify public good, in terms of research on the farm.

We're only 2% of the population now, or less; about 98% of the people have to be fed from those farms or from export.

My name is Irish as well, and my grandfather was born in Ireland in 1822. He would have been 25 at the time of the great Irish potato famine. He died in Valcartier, Quebec, in 1879. He lived through some of those times when there wasn't a proper distribution of power, I guess. I'd like to see us avoid that and put more dollars into good public research so that farmers can operate more stably.

The other thing I've noticed is that you can either pay me now or you can pay me later. It's like changing oil in your truck. If you don't look after things at the front, you'll end up paying more at the end, and either we pay that through being less competitive and having higher food costs by not having the appropriate research—and as I pointed out, appropriate research should be done partly by farmers so that there is always an alternative there. Of course, the multinationals, which have huge resources and world programs that could be leveraged for many countries, will also be part of those answers.

I don't know if that answers it or not.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

The issue I hear from the large seed companies and their sense of what they want to do, especially in the oilseeds and primarily in the grain sector, and about their lack of investment in this country, is this very sense of farmers saving seeds, so then there isn't a market for them per se, or it's too small, so they don't wish to do that. If we're talking about the public good versus a large seeds and plant breeder, how do we find a way to balance the two?

Obviously, we're not suggesting they can't do things. If they're saying you need to open up and let us do more in those sectors, which basically pushes the public good out, how do we balance that?

I'll go to Mr. Rourke.

Mr. Vandaele, if you'd like to take the last bit of whatever time Mr. Tweed will give us to finish off with that, I'd appreciate it. I know you're in the seed business. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on it.

[David Rourke]

Certainly we don't want to extract a lot more money out of our farm budgets so that multinationals can make a profit. They have to give us something in return that's worth more than we're getting now.

Cal and I were talking about the canola industry and how dramatically that's changed, yet how it hasn't changed. While there are some innovations, the risk has gone up. To find that balance is going to be difficult. Even a farmer-owned plant-breeding company is going to have to find the money from some source, and that's going to have to come from individual farmers. They're going to have to pay a certain amount, either as an end-use royalty, a royalty on the seed, or a check-off, to pay for that new technology.

Traditionally we've been getting it through public good and through the plant-breeding organizations of Agriculture Canada, as well as some provincial programs and some universities. If that's going to diminish, then we have to look for other alternatives.

To create that balance of increased cost to farmers and more net return, I think it's an uphill battle for some of those big companies. What are they going to bring to the table that's going to be worth that much more money that farmers would be willing to pay them that much more? I have some doubts.

In the public press, there have been all kinds of criticisms of the western Canadian plant-breeding system and how far we are behind in wheat. I picked up an article yesterday from Montana, and I see it increased yields 25% by putting pulse crops in the rotation with wheat. It went from 18 bushels to 23 bushels. The Wheat Board wasn't hampering them and the Canadian variety registration system wasn't hampering them. They had full access to whatever is available around the world in that environment.

We're in tough growing conditions. In the last 30 years.... Let me put it another way. I can increase the yield on my farm by double, and I can tell you exactly how to do that. If I reduce the temperature in the growing season by 2°, and only 2° on average, I can double the wheat yields on my farm. I did that in 1985 and I did that in 2009. I can bring in German material and I can bring all kinds of material, and it doesn't necessarily perform very well. We don't get 150 bushels an acre just by bringing German material and U.K. material into our environment. It's tough work to get those yield increases.

As I pointed out before, with the Western Feed Grain Development Co-op, we've actually done pretty well in the time we've being operating.

[Cal Vandaele]

I think David makes some good comments.

When I was a young man starting in the seed business, it was a different world. We had a lot of public, maybe private, varieties in the marketplace, but the royalty structure on a bushel of seed sold to the farmer was about one-tenth of what it is today. We were remitting royalties of anywhere from 10¢ to 25¢ a bushel on seed varieties back then to organizations like SeCan. As public plant-breeding money was cut off, we've seen higher and higher royalty structures in the seed business, as plant breeders had to get a return on their investment. It wasn't long before we stared seeing royalties more along the lines of $1 a bushel on certified seed sales. That's when we saw the farmers resort more to brown-bag seed, using their own seed, and not buying new seed in the same quantities.

If you talk to most seed growers or seed processors in western Canada, they would say they've seen a drastic reduction in the amount of seed they sell versus 20 years ago. If it were only 25¢ a bushel, most farmers would be more inclined to buy higher volumes of certified seed and new varieties, as David was saying. If 10 farmers bought all their seed at 25¢ a bushel royalty, it generates a lot more money at the end of the day than farmers buying smaller amounts at the higher royalties. It's an economic engine.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Go ahead, please, Mr. Hoback.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, gentlemen, for braving the cold and coming out and being with us here this morning to talk about this.

You both touched on some very interesting things that we've heard before in the committee—for example, low-level presence, and Mr. Vandaele, you talked about that. That's something that is a must, whether it's in Canada or abroad. Low-level presence is something we need to have in our trade agreements and see brought about in the markets we're selling to. Your example of flax is a prime example of why low-level presence is required. Don't worry, we're going to fight for you on that one, for sure.

Mr. Rourke, you talked about public plant-breeding and you talked about farmers getting together to do plant-breeding. One of the complaints I used to hear all the time was that we didn't have a great stock of personnel coming through the ranks of the universities to actually take part in this public plant-breeding.

Do you see that improving? Do you see more skills coming through the university ranks and more people looking at that as a career opportunity versus what we've seen in the past?

[David Rourke]

This is a good point, and I reflected on this issue yesterday. If there are fewer public programs and a diminished ability to train people within public universities or Ag Canada systems, we will eventually have a diminished capacity to do private plant-breeding work.

In our own situation, we've used a couple of plant breeders. One was a retired Ag Canada plant breeder; he made the initial crosses on this new variety. We have one fellow from Pakistan and we have one guy from China—really good people, but we just don't seem to be able to find the same type of quality locally.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

How do we encourage more students to look at this? Wages are one thing for sure, but there is quality of life. There are a variety of reasons that this would be a good career.

What do you think are the main obstacles preventing students from considering this as a career path?

[David Rourke]

There are probably a couple of things.

One is that in order to get, say, a Ph.D. in plant breeding, you have to come up with something new, and sometimes those things aren't very practical from a plant-breeding organization's point of view. Sometimes they're cutting-edge and somebody will use them, but in our type of situation, we need people who are hands-on and know how to put seed in the ground and make the crosses and be all-encompassing. There are certainly Ag Canada breeders and university breeders who do this, but the training to get a Ph.D. in plant breeding today isn't very conducive to it.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Mr. Vandaele, you talked about some of the labour issues. This is something we're hearing about across the sector, not just on the grain farming side of things: we're hearing it from honey producers.

In the situation with honey producers in my riding, one thing is that the province has the ability to make exemptions in labour market opinions. They can look at the trade in a sector and say that in this sector, we just can't get enough people, so we don't need to go through the process of doing the advertising and we can be given an exemption. Then you can look at bringing employees back year after year from certain countries, to build some consistency in your work force.

Have you talked to the Government of Manitoba about that? The province would control that type of situation.

[Cal Vandaele]

Yes, we've cooperated with the Manitoba immigration department on getting some of these people into Canada, and they have been quite supportive, but ultimately Service Canada has the final say; the Manitoba immigration department is basically a go-between. As well, there are so many technicalities: you have to advertise in your local newspapers, get quotes from the national job bank....

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

That's a misconception. That's what we believed in Saskatchewan. Then we found out that this is not the case; actually, the province has the ability to say that a sector is exempt, meaning you don't have to go through the whole advertising process. The province can go back to Service Canada and say that in this sector, we have such a shortage of employees that we have no ability to find those employees in Canada on a year-to-year basis.

I wonder whether you've been informed of this and have looked at it as an option to get through some of that paperwork and that bureaucratic nightmare in Service Canada.

[Cal Vandaele]

No, actually I'm not aware of it. That's interesting, and I'll certainly look into it. From the experience I've had with it, Service Canada had to give us the green light, and it's been a frustrating experience. One technicality in the advertising means there is reason to reject the LMO, etc.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Yes, there are lots of things. My honey producers were saying the same thing, and actually my grain producers are saying it now too.

The other thing talked about, Mr. Rourke, in relation to plant breeding and trying to double our yields or get more production, is that we're going to have to face the reality, going into 2020, 2030, 2040, 2050, that we have a population that's growing across the world and we're going to have to feed them.

A lot of resources are going into other areas to increase capacity or productivity. For example, you can go back to no tillage. In fact, Mr. Vandaele, you probably would remember the days before no tillage, and now no tillage has made a huge difference in production, and not only in that but in the environment and the efficiency of farming operations.

Do you think government should have a role in looking at other areas of efficiency gain in agriculture? Again there's a problem: you're saying it should be in the seed sector, but the seed sector is just one part of the puzzle. When you look at the farming operation, you have the combines, you have the seeding equipment, you have the agronomics, such as with fertilizer.... When does the government involvement start and stop?

How do you see this question?

[David Rourke]

There are lots of questions that aren't answered, outside of the germplasm question. As we become warmer, we may have to look at different crops, and not just at whether or not we can find new and improved wheat: corn is becoming more of a reality in Manitoba now.

Some of us are still skeptical, because three times in the past it has increased in acreage and then has fallen. I think we're up to just over the acreage we were at in 1981, until we had an early frost and corn didn't look as promising, but if the global warming scenario is the reality it appears it will be, we can double our yields with things such as corn. That's certainly a possibility—just adding new crops and adapting things such as corn to our area.

There is another area I've been intrigued with, called biological farming. I did my master's work in zero tillage and I know there are a lot of advantages to it in building soil, but it's still a slow process.

Is there something that could be faster? In The Western Producer a couple of weeks ago, Dr. George Lazarovits, who used to be an Ag Canada employee and is now with A&L Biologicals, made note of a farmer in Ontario who got 300 bushels an acre of corn last year, whereas the neighbouring farms got 135 bushels. There is a case of doubling yields, but we don't know why it happened and why that farmer can do it.

I've tried some of these things on my own ticket under the auspices of biological farming. I can't get any ARDI support for it—that is, the Agri-Food Research and Development Initiative. Unfortunately, depending on the year.... Last year we got nothing from any of these things that we tried.

There is a role there for somebody to do something, and these are not things that the multinationals are promoting. If we can increase nutrient recycling in our soil in a faster way than using zero tillage and reduced tillage, nobody is working on such solutions.

That would be one example, but we're going to move very slowly unless we have some publicly funded dollars there.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

When it comes to that yield difference, it could be the difference between a New Holland and a John Deere combine, of course. You know that.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!