International Trade committee  I think what we will do is look at these things on a risk basis, hopefully. Europe has boxed itself in on a number of areas, including some of the products we use that are considered, from their point of view, ineligible, even though there's no food safety issue. By saying, “We won't accept that class of products, that class of inputs,” they close themselves off to some valuable inputs.

International Trade committee  That's right. It doesn't appear that their deal is going to happen overnight either.

International Trade committee  When it was announced, it was the first piece of good news for our industry in five years. We've had several pieces of news, more recently our new disease concern, but it is the first time we have been ahead of our major competitors in accessing a new market. We're playing catch-up in some other cases.

International Trade committee  We've seen a significant competition emerge from the United States. Back when NAFTA was implemented, the United States was a big net importer of pork. Now they're the world's largest exporter. There's no question if we want to continue to be a major exporter, we have to look at being able to export more and more of our production and have more and more of our exports going to non-NAFTA markets.

International Trade committee  Agriculture has had a kind of standing consultation group for some time that provides updates not just on CETA but on other trade negotiations to all agrifood groups that want to be involved in them, both those interested in exports and those who are concerned about imports. In addition, because of this one being so important to us, we certainly did avail ourselves of the opportunities that we know all other interested parties have had, and again, both those interested in exports and those interested in what will be the import levels of some products.

International Trade committee  Certainly in the case of beef their supply chains are already looking at how they will ensure that the product meets the EU specifications. It's the same case for my sector, pork, where we're not using it. Even though their products are approved in most pork-producing countries of the world, they are not in the EU, so we respect we need to produce it without the use of it.

International Trade committee  We know we have four companies already in Canada that are in a position to ship to the European Union. They meet all the requirements in terms of the feeding, in terms of the processing, and they have the supply lines that meet those requirements. Beef is a little bit further behind on that in that they just haven't had these market opportunities present themselves.

International Trade committee  We don't ship very much under our existing quotas because they have very, very high tariffs. We do have actually a Canada quota that we achieved when the European Union expanded to include countries like Hungary and Poland. We have never used that because there is a tariff on that which is approaching a dollar a kilogram.

International Trade committee  I would not be doing justice to the Canola Council to suggest that I really understand their biotech issues in depth, but I have been part of delegations that have gone over. I think their major issue at the moment is in terms of the EU inability to accommodate any level in the infinitesimal amounts of biotech products, genetically modified corn or soybeans that have not yet been approved by the EU and which render shipping quantities of non-genetically modified crops very risky because of the inability to know ahead of time that there won't be this tiniest bit of GM residue found in the container vehicle.

International Trade committee  Thank you very much. Bonjour. Good morning. My name is Martin Rice. I'm a director of the Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance. I represent the Canadian Pork Council, and I am pleased to be here on CAFTA's behalf to speak to committee members on the Canada-European Union comprehensive economic and trade agreement, or CETA.