Environment committee  Not at this point. I would defer comment on the water act to Environment Canada, but we do work closely with them on a lot of agri-environmental issues, including water.

Environment committee  I would have to get back to you on that.

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  Again, I think I have to defer to ECCC, which does the water quality.

Environment committee  I would have to defer that to ECCC, which is in charge of measuring water quality.

Environment committee  I can't comment on the budget for the water agency. I will have to defer to ECCC on that, as they're the lead for the federal government.

Environment committee  Thanks for the question. I recall that there is a shared jurisdiction, as many of you probably know, between the federal, provincial and territorial governments. The provinces and territories have the primary jurisdiction over land and natural resource ownership. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership is a massive investment of $3.5 billion.

Environment committee  The sustainable agriculture advisory committee is composed of federal and sector stakeholders; however, there were specific ongoing discussions with provinces and territories bilaterally, and specific PT sessions were held during development of the strategy.

Environment committee  Unfortunately, gene editing is outside of my scope. I can get back to you on that one. I do know that we work closely with Health Canada on a multitude of issues—

Environment committee  On the question of raising the maximum residue limits, that's outside of my responsibility, but I can take it back to the department.

Environment committee  Yes.

Environment committee  AAFC is continuing to collaborate with ECCC to identify linkages between the water agency and the freshwater action plan to the agricultural sector. As you mentioned, pesticides are an important issue, and we definitely recognize that pesticides play an important role for producers in securing crop and yield and in quality research.

Environment committee  I'll just say quickly that increasing the adoption of on-farm beneficial management practices that are available through our cost-sharing partnership with the provinces and territories is a good first step. AAFC also has ongoing research in this area.

Environment committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, for inviting my department to speak to the committee's study on fresh water in Canada. My name is Kevin Norris, and I am the director of the resilient agriculture policy division, which is located in the strategic policy branch at AAFC. I'm joined by my colleague Catherine Champagne, who is an environmental scientist and the manager of earth observations in the science and technology branch.