Agriculture committee  The basis of the U.S. system is similar. They are a science-based system—and Ian could speak to this. It does tend to be a bit faster in the United States now. It's up in the air as to where that's going because in the U.S., they are now questioning how they are going to regulate, if at all, some of the new technologies that are coming along, including what's called CRISPR technology.

Agriculture committee  There is no question that ambitious goals have been set out. We saw them in budget 2017, and we hear them talked about. What we've said is that we need a regulatory system that is flexible enough to provide new tools to farmers. There won't be that expansion without a regulatory system that is responsive enough.

Agriculture committee  Yes, that is correct. We need change and reform in our regulatory system if we want to realize those goals, because they're exceptionally ambitious. We're talking about trying to take Canada from number five in the world to number two. That's a tremendous goal, and we're excited about that goal, but there needs to be a road map to get there.

Agriculture committee  Over to you, Ian.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. We appreciate the invitation today. With me is my colleague Ian Affleck, our executive director of plant biotechnology for CropLife Canada. Although many aspects of the plant science industry have evolved since we were first established in 1952, our main purpose remains the same: providing tools to help farmers be more productive and more sustainable.

Agriculture committee  I think the key term there is “peer-reviewed”. The agencies themselves are looking at peer-reviewed science. You're absolutely right that in the daily bombard of social media, we're hit with a number of studies of varying quality. The good news is that we have regulatory agencies who have a statutory responsibility to review peer-reviewed studies.

Agriculture committee  It's making value judgments. Generally, we look to the food policy in the same way the government is approaching the NAFTA talks: first, do no harm. We just want to make sure that a food policy isn't giving a nod to one particular sector over another. If you allow agriculture to move forward, there's plenty of production room for everyone.

Agriculture committee  We would respectfully disagree. There's a market for everyone. No one is out there trying to denigrate one particular group or the other. What we're saying is that we don't want to see a nod to one group over the other, because that would harm growth. It would harm innovation. It would be the exact opposite of providing affordable, abundant food for Canadians.

Agriculture committee  Yes, and that's been a huge focus of ours the last number of years. We recognized a few years ago that, frankly, the industry had fallen behind on that. We hadn't done a good enough job educating the public and talking to them. We're not going to have large numbers of people coming from the farm.

Agriculture committee  I guess one of our ongoing questions when we have looked at this is how much of this is agricultural policy versus social policy? That's obviously a question that everyone will have to wrestle with. We obviously can't speak to social policy; we can speak to the agricultural policy.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. On behalf of CropLife Canada and our member companies, I will say that we very much appreciate the invitation to appear today. CropLife Canada is the trade association representing the manufacturers, developers, and distributors of plant science innovations, including pest control products and products of modern plant breeding, for use in agricultural, urban, and public health settings.

Finance committee  As I say, right now they look somewhat siloed. Here's the government talking about the Barton report, and there's discussion on innovation. In the meantime, there are regulatory agencies that aren't seized with it. What we want is for this to be written into their mandate. To give you a “for instance”, in PMRA's strategic plan there used to be reference to this, right up to a few years ago.

Finance committee  Absolutely. A great deal of the research that is going on now is towards new consumer traits. In the first generation, if you will, of biotechnology it was about higher yields. The industry did a great job on that. Now what you're seeing...of course in your region you would probably know Okanagan Specialty Fruits and the Arctic apple, a tremendous Canadian innovation.

Finance committee  The question now is what kind of a regulatory environment do we have that's going to allow that to be commercialized quickly. Is that innovation going to come to Canada or is it going to go elsewhere? Obviously we would vastly prefer to see it in Canada.

Finance committee  The second wave of innovation, if you will, is going to be that more consumer-focused kind of innovation.