Finance committee  Not in its completeness yet. We are working on some of the areas where some insurance may lead to that, but in the interim there's nothing that's available off the shelf that would truly compensate our industry for the birds and for the loss of production. It is something we are

Finance committee  Supply management is truly, in my opinion, one of the pillars of economic stability in agriculture. The main reason for that is our ability to get our cost of production from the marketplace. Supply management across the country is...a lot of rural benefits are truly being take

Finance committee  If it were five cents, it would be an opportunity that perhaps could be involved in a cost-of-production formula.

Finance committee  Do you mean with regard to an avian influenza?

Finance committee  There are obviously repercussions for industry. But we as an industry are always doing things to the best of our ability to make sure we don't have disease outbreaks. When we have an avian influenza opportunity that shows itself in Canada, it's devastating to our industry. We ne

Finance committee  If it's in the interest of the public good, which it would be in the case of a vaccine for avian influenza, it would be an opportunity that could be shared federally, provincially, and with the producers

Finance committee  It would be rather difficult, but I could give you a scenario.

Finance committee  I was going to give you an example. For an eradication of approximately two million birds, the cost would be roughly $12.5 million in addition to the Health of Animals cost relative to that, which would be an additional $6 million. So if it were a two-million bird eradication, th

Finance committee  Our whole industry actually shares in a lot of the risk. On farms we are constantly doing programs such as Start Clean-Stay Clean, and we are always looking to ensure that our product goes to consumers on a safe basis, so they have confidence in it. The compensation for avian in

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon. My name is Peter Clarke. I'm an egg producer from Nova Scotia. With me today in the audience is fellow vice-chair Maurice Richard, an egg producer from the province of Quebec. As vice-chairs of the Canadian Egg Marketing Agency--CEMA--we

Agriculture committee  There isn't a way of eliminating the threat of avian influenza, because it occurs naturally in migratory birds. It's always going to be out there. It's our industry. Supply management is a business risk program, and through it we can try to mitigate those risks. We have done that

Agriculture committee  The migratory bird process has always been in North America. There's that and the ability of our population to travel more and possibly pick up contamination through clothing or walking through excrement, and so forth. All those are opportunities. Because of more ease of travel,

Agriculture committee  I would confirm that there are a lot of younger people getting into our industry, surprisingly, and we're pleased about that. But you spoke about the cost of getting into agriculture. There's a cost to get into an awful lot of different areas of livelihood today, whether you want

Agriculture committee  I'm not familiar with that, no. You'll have to be more explicit.

Agriculture committee  If you don't mind, on that particular point I cannot stress enough the fact that right now, with whatever is in place, the $8, if that's all there is, is not enough.