Agriculture committee  To help me understand, you're wondering as far as timelines are concerned, the importance to get the bill passed. Is that correct?

Agriculture committee  Okay. For us, because there are some good things in the bill, sooner is better than later. I would also add a caveat to that and say we should do it together in conjunction, like we're doing today where we're discussing ideas and what works for different sectors. To me, that's m

Agriculture committee  Currently the loan program has ceilings or caps and when they were implemented that would have been reflective to bring value to our industry at that time, but since then, our industry has grown and the caps need to be revamped. As for the CALA, right now there is a maximum of $5

Agriculture committee  Doesn't that sound easy? I think a $5-million cap would be more reflective of where the industry is right now.

Agriculture committee  The pork council would like to be involved all the way through the process. I think it's very valuable for regulators as well as producers, in this case the Pork Council, to walk alongside each other and build something together. It's accepted better that way than if it's mandate

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon. As mentioned, my name is Rick Bergmann. I'm a hog producer from Steinbach, Manitoba, and the vice-chair of the Canadian Pork Council. First of all, I would like to thank the members of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agricultu

Agriculture committee  To associate a number like that.... I don't have it in my head right now, but maybe Jean-Guy would have that. I know it is very significant. As you know, because of the opportunity, it is very large.

Agriculture committee  Absolutely.

Agriculture committee  I agree with your comments that if we're world renowned we'd better be popular back home as well. So that's one of the things we're working on through a domestic marketing committee that has been struck. The process there is to kind of mimic what CPI has done around the world and

Agriculture committee  —truckers in the pork world, if they're hauling to a federal plant, do go through a trucking quality assurance program, which is another thing our industry does to ensure our consumers recognize that throughout the whole chain there is a lot of quality.

Agriculture committee  I don't know if I can define it as “the market” but certainly advancement in Korea and TPP—all these different areas where maybe it's a challenge, but a good challenge. Our world population is growing. If you look at their needs, more and more people in those countries want to ha

Agriculture committee  Very good. As we move forward and government and industry look to the future with the Growing Forward 2 program, we find it critical that we work together on these programs and develop them together to ensure that we have a program that's workable for all producers in Canada. T

Agriculture committee  Very good. Merci, Jean-Guy. Good afternoon. Thanks for this opportunity. I'd like to speak a little bit about Canada Pork International. The pork industry's exports have skyrocketed in the past 20 years. We are now very export-dependent. Market access is therefore very crit