Agriculture committee  Thank you. In 2006 AAFC published a science and innovation strategy, which outlines seven scientific priorities. That document is available publicly; it's on the web. In that document, we indicate our belief in investing in science and innovation, which will serve, of course, pr

Agriculture committee  NSERC reports to the Minister of Industry. So does the NRC. So that question would be appropriate for those departments.

Agriculture committee  Yes. During the Growing Forward consultations, the message was clear that science and innovation are components of the long-term success of the industry. We have heard that comment pretty much coast to coast. We are intent on putting more emphasis on science and innovation under

Agriculture committee  One concept that is gaining a fair amount of popularity and is being studied more intensively is the concept of bio-refineries. You wouldn't extract a single product out of a single plant. A typical plant might contain something like 40,000 different compounds that have been synt

Agriculture committee  During the consultations for Growing Forward, we certainly heard a message that science and innovation were important for the future of the sector, more specifically in the context of bioproducts. We recognized that prior to the implementation of Growing Forward. Again, the agric

Agriculture committee  Last year the ABIP, the Agricultural Bioproducts Innovation Program, was announced. It is meant to develop solutions adapted to the Canadian reality. Sugar cane ethanol is probably not the way to go for Canada, and the ABIP program is designed to develop Canadian solutions that w

Agriculture committee  Waste as well; lignocellulosic includes a variety of feed stocks, including wastes—forest waste, agricultural waste, corn stover.

Agriculture committee  To go back to your question about who's driving innovation, we're the drivers. We have producer organizations across the country that are very vocal and make their opinions known. We receive letters on a daily basis about what they see as priorities for their producers, their mem

Agriculture committee  We're not reducing. The budget of the research branch has remained more or less the same for a number of years, seven or eight years now, or eight or nine years. It has remained relatively stable. In addition, with the ABIP, the agricultural bioproducts innovation program, there

Agriculture committee  It's replacing the 15 to 30 or so who leave every year. The demographic is that we lose 15 or 30, depending on the year, and now we're replacing 17 of them. It's not necessarily the end of our recruitment effort this year, but I can tell you that this is what we're doing right no

Agriculture committee  We have scientists who continue to be a very enthusiastic and keen crowd. They rarely retire before 65, which is a little different from what else is happening in the public service. Scientists are keen. They want to contribute. They're by and large a passionate crowd. The young

Agriculture committee  Forecasting the future is always risky, and I'd be speculating if I went too far there. But referring to an earlier question, there is a market that is perhaps more diversified than it used to be. We have market segments that are focused more on organic, more on healthy food, m

Agriculture committee  It is very important for new products to be subject to credible regulations. In Canada, we apply a regulatory system based on scientific knowledge, and we must continue generating scientific data to support regulatory approval. I have examined the transcripts of the hearings you

Agriculture committee  That is a question you should put to Health Canada and to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

Agriculture committee  With the demographics that we have, we're replacing between 15 and 30 researchers, scientists, a year. As I said earlier, we're in the process of recruiting 17 scientists now. We're doing interviews, and so on. We have to also keep in mind, as we're replacing scientists, where w