Agriculture committee  Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada is a big government department. I work for the science and technology branch, so I can speak authoritatively to technical answers with bees but not AgriStability programs. I'm afraid I can't specifically answer your question. You'd have to go to some of my colleagues in other branches of the department.

Agriculture committee  That question I can answer. Thank you for your interest. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada has been involved in projects looking at developing markers for breeding bees. These would be markers based on the proteins expressed by honeybees or markers in their genome and genetics.

Agriculture committee  I can speak to the question if I interpreted it correctly. One of the losses with long-distance transport from, let's say, New Zealand or Australia compared to the U.S.... There would be lower risk coming from a shorter distance, but I will also point out that Canada has successfully imported bees from Australia and New Zealand for decades now.

Agriculture committee  Yes. Dr. Guarna is spending her time on a couple of studies, but one she's particularly taking the lead on is looking at the quality of queens being imported into Canada. The Canadian honeybee industry is very dependent on importing large volumes of queens, particularly from the U.S., and one of the consistent reasons cited by beekeepers in terms of concerns for the colony losses has been the quality of queens, their longevity, and their performance.

Agriculture committee  I just met the Atlantic transfer team in P.E.I. two weeks ago, so I can speak to that as well. I think you have two great individuals who are well trained and very eager to serve Maritimes beekeepers. I think this is a wonderful step forward in developing the industry and perhaps really looking at ways of implementing latest findings or developing practices that may be more specific to the Maritimes to improve the success and vitality of that industry.

Agriculture committee  I think there tend to be differences year to year just in looking at large geographic biomes of the country. Things on the Prairies tend to be similar in terms of concerns and influences. That often differs from other provinces such as British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritimes.

Agriculture committee  I'm assuming I'm supposed to speak to this, and somebody else can join in if they wish. Certainly, there are many factors affecting survival, and a huge one is weather as well. In a year that we have particularly high losses, my observation has been that it can be related to the severity and length of winter, which can be very regionally dependent within Canada, of course.

Agriculture committee  I think we know what key factors interact, and I think their interactions are very much dependent on the region, the severity of weather, for example, the crop systems, but the facts that you mentioned are essentially the leading culprits. We have a very complex system now of introduced diseases and parasites, which are more difficult to manage.

Agriculture committee  Most of that is systematics, although there is some disease-related work as well. At the central experimental farm in Ottawa, where you are, you have certainly the Canadian national collection of insects, and we have a systematics expert looking at native bees and diversity, abundance, and factors that may be affecting their health as well.

Agriculture committee  PMRA is intensively reviewing neonicotinoids and risks associated with them. Certainly the PMRA also has some internal studies looking at the risks of neonics to honeybees. So in terms of risks to honeybee health, I think the PMRA is in a better position to answer that question, although within AAFC we are looking at relative residues of insecticides in hive products and in crops, and by simply looking at the levels present, we can also do a cursory evaluation of how available they are to bees in realistic field settings.

Agriculture committee  If I knew the answer to that question, my job would be a lot simpler.

Agriculture committee  Yes, absolutely. Maybe I'll preface my answer by answering your first question about whether we should be concerned about the bees and whether losses are a problem across the country: yes. Over the last nine years across Canada, we have an average rate of loss of 26%. Some of the more acute losses have been documented in Ontario.

Agriculture committee  Thanks. Certainly the federal government and Agriculture have always had concern over honeybee health. If you look over the long term, they have always been interested in looking at treatments for honeybee colonies whether for varroa mites, which are a long-standing problem in Canada and most other parts of the world, or other diseases and pests.

Agriculture committee  We have people across the country working on bee health. In terms of honeybees, the primary site for working on that is here in Beaverlodge, Alberta. For some of the larger projects, we are working with partners across the country to give us the reach to study in different areas.

Agriculture committee  Good afternoon. I am Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's lead scientist specializing in honeybee research. I'm here today to represent the science and technology branch. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada appreciates the opportunity to provide you with information on the important ongoing work we are doing to help improve the health of honeybees in Canada and to provide an update on our current diagnostic capacity for testing and measuring bee health.