That's a fascinating question.
Irrigation is particularly challenging. Like many infrastructure projects, it has a long-term investment horizon and there are considerable public spillover effects. The federal report “Prairie Prosperity”, for example, has research that has looked at the value of irrigation. Most value from irrigation is actually received outside of the farm. That's because of the jobs, the added production and the spinoff impacts that happen in the community. There's a value to the greater public. Our rationale would be that there's a value for public support and engagement in these major infrastructure projects that can develop the industry.
It's a challenging project to move forward, because it's so massive and requires such a substantial amount of upfront capital investment, requiring public support and engagement when only a few small residents are irrigators. Although the benefit impacts the greater province and the greater country, it's challenging to tell that story to those outside of the farm gate. Although there ultimately would be a major contribution from the public sector in that investment, that's a difficult story to tell and to move forward.
Since these spillover effects affect provincial outcomes and national outcomes, you're requiring partnership between the province and Canada to support a project that's transformational, such as the development of Lake Diefenbaker. We've seen this project visited a minimum of four times since 1967. It's not to say that it hasn't been worked on. Periodically, investment is discussed and we bring forward the idea that this is an important question and we see the value in it, but finding the strength to continue this project to fruition has been one of the challenges.