Agriculture committee  Mr. Chairman, why don't I start the responses? First, let's talk about yogourt for a few minutes. Yogourt has been a tremendously exciting and successful product in the dairy industry. In the last 15 years or so, it's experienced 5% to 10% growth per year, so Canadian consumers are demonstrating their interest in purchasing dairy ingredients through yogourt as the dairy product.

Agriculture committee  Yes. And as I tried to explain in my opening remarks, if it's an imported dairy product, it's clearly designated where it's from: it's a product of France, Italy, or the U.S.A. It's very clear that it's imported.

Agriculture committee  I gave the current reference to the Food and Drugs Act and the regulations. With Bill C-51, there's been a significant addition to subsection 5(1) of the act. I think it's been purposely put there to address some of the concerns you're focused on currently at the committee level.

Agriculture committee  No. As I mentioned, the number of the dairy establishment has to be on the package label. We just looked at dairy products, for example, and there's a vast range of dairy products in the dairy case right now. It's quite noticeable that website addresses and 1-800 lines to the manufacturer have been added to many of our products.

Agriculture committee  I constructed my opening remarks to make the point that when it comes to food products generally in Canada and the current labeling requirements for all food products, there are already very significant and extensive information requirements. Then I described the specific requirements for dairy products, which are probably even more intensive and prescriptive than for general food products.

Agriculture committee  No, not really. I think the concerns are more oriented to other commodity groups--the horticultural area and so on--and there is not abuse or misuse or confusion when it comes to dairy products, either by the suppliers or at the consumer level. My only comment, though, is that of course for any changes, you have to be careful with respect to the voluntary nature of the change, in terms of what you make mandatory versus what's voluntary in terms of “Product of Canada” labelling.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will respect the patience of the committee members, and I'll certainly stick to eight or nine minutes with my introductory remarks. Mr. Chairman and committee members, the dairy processors welcome the opportunity of assisting your committee in its study of “Product of Canada” labelling.

Agriculture committee  No, absolutely not. It has nothing to do with the nutritional value; in fact, as Mr. Matte said earlier, these are superior products that are imported and used. They are used around the world in making cheese, in most other jurisdictions, including France and the U.S.

Agriculture committee  I'll just add to Mr. Matte's comments that the numbers, if they were crunched out.... First off, if you were going to make the necessary major investment in ultrafiltration to create these MPIs in Canada, you'd have to compete with sophisticated companies in New Zealand and in Europe that do it for the world market.

Agriculture committee  The first question is the question we're all asking ourselves--everyone around this table. The minister put forward a very good recommendation a month ago that we, the processors and the producers, should sit together and examine all these issues that we've put on the table and try to come up with some broad understanding and agreement on the principles involved, the underlying issues, and a way forward.

Agriculture committee  Yes, of course. That's why we're in business.

Agriculture committee  No. I disagree with that last comment. I believe the MPI issue is manageable. I've already addressed the numbers with respect to the.... The macro number is being referenced for a wide range of imported dairy ingredients, but the MPI, I think, is very manageable. Mr. Matte and Mr.

Agriculture committee  I believe the chairman read the mandate of this discussion. I think it's related specifically to the use of MPCs and the imports of MPCs/MPIs. It would not be a correct figure if what we're here to discuss is MPCs/MPIs. There's a host of dairy ingredients that go way beyond MPCs/MPIs.

Agriculture committee  Let me start by indicating that we don't think there are a few difficulties in the industry; we think there are many. There are very difficult and profound issues that really need to be addressed. The MPC/MPI issue is a symptom and one issue out of many. Mr. Bellavance, you mentioned article 28, which we've examined as an industry.

Agriculture committee  Thank you for your patience, Mr. Chair. We wanted to make sure those key points were made.