Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, committee members, my name is Bryan Inglis, and I am vice-president of the agricultural division of Co-op Atlantic. I'm very pleased to be here today to represent my organization in front of the House of Commons Special Committee on Coopera

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  The Magdalen Islands, Quebec.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes. In our experience, we find it very difficult, as cooperatives, to access the federal and provincial programs. It's very similar to the capitalization that Tom talked about. Governments have a real difficulty understanding how co-ops are capitalized, and they are basically ve

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes, exactly.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  I'm talking about a little bit of both. I'm talking mainly about start-ups, but I know that in our particular case, Co-op Atlantic just finished an $8 million investment in a feed mill in Atlantic Canada. We didn't get any support from the province or the federal government on th

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  On the going-forward projects, there are a number of what I call subagreements—I don't think they're called that anymore—where they encourage investment in new technology in agriculture. They encourage moving-forward modernizations, and we could not get any support.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  I'd be happy to do that.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Co-op Atlantic is successful. We've been around for 85 years. I've been working there for more than 25 now, dealing a lot with agriculture and development. I've dealt a lot with agricultural producer cooperatives. It's not the big ones that are the concern, although they do have

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes. It's mostly the financial side and the capitalization side of the funding of co-ops. And it is in the credit unions as well as on the traditional banking side. To give Farm Credit their due, Farm Credit is probably one of the stronger ones. Certainly in Atlantic Canada, in

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Well, I'm very excited about this. Again, it's something we don't talk a lot about. It's something we started back in the seventies when one of our senior management went over to Europe and brought back the fact that we should develop co-op seniors homes. Working with CMHC back a

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes. Our program has been diluted significantly compared to back when we really had a strong relationship with them. We have done some fabulous projects with them over the last probably 30 or 40 years, but those programs have pretty well dried up.

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Yes. I believe now is a great time to enhance, to modernize. There is nothing wrong with the program ending. We have this happen all the time. The federal government has had lots of subagreements over the years that have evolved, right? I think we should learn from the past. We

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  The opportunity is to allow programs to help capitalize cooperatives in rural communities. We're seeing a lot of people who want to go back to the land. We can see the local food movement, and we can see it's not just farming. People who are retiring in rural communities want acc

Special Committee on Cooperatives committee  Jeff is right on. In my experience, when the co-op boards are educated and they understand their cooperative strategic plan.... There are a hundred co-ops that are member-owners of Co-op Atlantic, and almost all of them have strategic plans that are very focused on the future,