Agriculture Committee on March 29th, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

We're going to call this meeting to order. We continue with our study on the business risk management programs.

I want to welcome to the table today Bob Friesen of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture; from the Union des producteurs agricoles, Denis Bilodeau and Gilbert Lavoie; and from the National Farmers Union, Stewart Wells and Darrin Qualman.

Welcome, everyone. I appreciate your taking time out of your busy schedules to come here to give us your wish list in business risk management as we kick off our study on the agricultural policy framework, which we will be conducting over the next month.

We're going to hold you all to ten minutes so that we have a chance for discussion. This is going to be a one-hour round, and then we're going to finish off at 4:30 to 5:30 with the Canadian Association of Agri-Retailers and the Canadian Bankers Association to talk about how farm policy impacts their industries.

With that, I open it up to you, Mr. Friesen.

[Bob Friesen, President, Canadian Federation of Agriculture]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Let me begin by saying that I would like to applaud you as chair and this committee for engaging in this very important discussion.

I would also like to preface my comments by saying first that the discussion on business risk management doesn't always have to be about more money. It also has a lot to do with how strategic we are with the money we flow. Are we being strategic with the way we flow the money? Are we being effective in the way we flow money? Are we being as effective as we can be in using taxpayers' money to help sustain farmers through periods of crisis?

Business risk management programs were never meant to be programs that create profitability. They are meant to sustain farmers through a period of crisis. When we talk about profitability, of course, there are all kinds of other things that we can include in the discussion.

The other thing I would like to say is that business risk management programs don't always have to be what we refer to as traditional safety net programs. They could also be such things as a biofuel initiative, or incentive-based environmental programs like, say, the ALUS program. Those can be initiatives that also help the income crisis and help move farmers towards a more profitable stage.

I would like to also say that some of the changes that have been made to what we have in our current suite of safety net programs have been very positive. You will know about the inventory evaluation change, the improvement in negative margin coverage, and of course the announcement we had a couple of weeks ago with regard to changing the top tier of CAIS to a contributory tier, which we believe is very positive. We're looking forward to working out the details of that top contributory tier.

Of course, on that one we certainly hope the provinces are going to support that leadership. We hope they will support the concept of the top tier as well. We would like them to contribute some money, of course.

We believe the cost-of-production approach that was announced is positive also. It will draw attention to one of the biggest impacts of farm profitability, and that is escalating input costs.

So there are a lot of positive things that have already happened.

We circulated a handout. I'm going to focus my comments on a few of the components in that handout.

We certainly support the work that's being done on production insurance for other commodities, aside from grains and oilseeds. We hope the production insurance development for those commodities is going to result in an insurance product that works for farmers. We want to make sure the product does work well and that farmers will want to use it: otherwise, it will end up being simply a premium for a CAIS offset. We have to make sure it's effective.

We of course also support the work on the catastrophic disaster component that's been talked about.

Having said that, I'd like to focus on a few of the other components. One, of course, and you will read it in the handout, is that we believe supply management should be defined as a business risk management program. They don't want to be part of the top tiers of our safety net program. They of course want to be eligible for disaster, because you can have disasters there, but they feel their policy is a business risk management program and that it simply needs to be defined as that.

The other thing I would like to focus on is companion programs. You may recall that the industry was dragged kicking and screaming to the table in the first development of the agricultural policy framework. We had a provision there that provinces could use some of the federal 60¢ if they contributed their 40¢ to help in the development of regional-specific or commodity-specific companion programs.

One of the things that's been talked about is that while our problems across Canada may be the same, the solutions aren't always the same. We sometimes have different solutions for different regions, different provinces, or different commodities. We would really like that provision back, so that the needs that can't be addressed by one national program can then be addressed by developing a companion program to fill the gaps.

And there are some examples of why that is necessary.

If you compare the agricultural industry in Prince Edward Island to the agricultural industry in Saskatchewan, they may have different needs that aren't addressed by a national program, and in that event we would like them to have the ability to be able to address those provincial-specific needs that crop up.

Saskatchewan might decide to develop something around improving their production insurance for grains and oilseeds. Prince Edward Island might develop something that's unique to their industry and that would better address a need in their industry.

If you talk commodity-specific, you will recall that prior to the APF, the horticulture industry had an SDRM, a self-directed risk management program, which was basically a NISA top-up at the time. That was meant to address the fact that they didn't have effective crop insurance programs for that industry, so the commodity had the ability to develop something specific to that industry that wasn't addressed by a national safety net program.

Those are some of the examples we've got whereby provinces could tailor something and be more effective in the way we flow money and in addressing some of those specific needs.

Another good example is the fact that the Ontario grains and oilseeds and the Quebec grains and oilseeds sectors have come up with a risk management program for their industry. That might work in Quebec and Ontario, because they don't export a lot of grains and oilseeds. Saskatchewan, on the other hand, is more sensitive to trade action because they export probably 85% to 90% of their production and might want to use something else to address something specific in declining margins in that industry, so we would really like to see the provision for companion programs to come back and allow that flexibility.

Now there are those that have told us they can't afford a provincial-specific companion program, and our answer to that is simply that we already have provinces that are tailoring certain components around the CAIS program. Alberta has done some things for the grains and oilseeds sector. Quebec of course has an ASRA program that is effective in their province.

So we're saying if those provinces that don't have enough of their own money could use some of the 60¢ coming from the federal government and contribute their 40¢, that would at least provide them with some seed money to develop something they could use in their own province.

I'll leave it at that, Mr. Chair. I'm not going to go into any more detail. I'd be happy to answer more detailed questions if you have them, but I'll leave it at that for now.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you, Mr. Friesen.

Mr. Bilodeau, ten minutes, please.

[Denis Bilodeau, Second Vice-President, Union des producteurs agricoles]

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for inviting us to appear before your committee.

I will briefly explain the situation of the UPA, which represents all agricultural producers in Quebec. The Quebec Farm Producers Act recognizes all agricultural producers within a single structure. That means that the UPA represents all of the producers. Forty-three thousand producers in Quebec are grouped on two levels, regional and specialized. We represent producers in every region and cover every type of agricultural output.

The UPA promotes the objective of autonomous agricultural undertakings with an emphasis on family farming. With respect to representation and land occupancy, we believe that this approach helps to ensure a good distribution and diversity of production. It is a given that, in some cases, help will be required to support certain types of crops.

In Quebec, the UPA has adopted a collective marketing approach, which has resulted in increased revenues. We intend to promote the recognition of income security measures to help bridge the gap caused by market fluctuations, but our main aim is to maximize our market income.

I think that through their intervention programs, the Canadian and provincial governments are seeking to address consumer needs while providing the producers with the best possible price for their product.

In Quebec, our work is, to a great extent, governed by the 50-year-old Act respecting the Marketing of Agricultural, Food and Fish Products, which gives us the leverage to maximize our earnings while ensuring the recognition of our production costs. This also helps to limit our involvement. However, from time to time, circumstances dictate that we must resort to some type of intervention. In such cases, we turn to the farm income stabilization insurance program, or FISI, which provides for an annual, stable farm income based on production costs. There is a cost associated with the products that are sold, but because of price fluctuations, some years are leaner than others. This program helps to stabilize farm income.

We have come before the committee today to urge the federal government to recognize these support programs which help us to work together. We are asking for federal government participation because an individual province cannot, on its own, respond to the needs of the producers.

Mr. Lavoie, a UPA economist, will now walk you through the various statistics that support the need for federal involvement.

[Gilbert Lavoie, Economist, Research and Agricultural Policy Branch, Union des producteurs agricoles]

Thank you, Mr. Bilodeau.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman.

Essentially, I will explain our document, beginning at page 8. I think the page number is the same in the English version. Yes, that is correct. I will give you a summary.

We started by analyzing the trends in total net farm income for Canada and, of course, for our province, Quebec. On the following pages there is a comparative analysis with our neighbours to the south, the Americans, to see what they are doing and what we can learn from them. I can say that, when it comes to any lessons that we might learn—and this goes along with Mr. Friesen's earlier comments—money is not the only factor when it comes to establishing net farm income; we also need business and industrial strategies. These strategies should be regional or provincial, rather than always applied on a Canada-wide basis. Strategic alliances are more likely to develop at a regional level.

I will now turn to page 8. When it comes to income security, in an open-market context, unfortunately, there is a higher concentration of consumers. I am referring to processors or the food distribution network. This leads to pressures that drive down profit margins which then results in a steady drop in farm income.

As Mr. Bilodeau said, the UPA is actively working to strengthen our collective system. This involves bringing producers together to provide them with more clout in the marketplace. This would involve a correction of the situation by stepping up the process to give power back to the producers within the group.

Turning to the statistics, on the top right-hand table, you will see a red and blue line. The red line represents dollars expressed as a constant, which means that the figures do not account for inflation. The blue line represents current dollars. We can see that income in Quebec was relatively stable from 1990 to 2006. In 2007, there is a sharp drop. We might wonder why that is. Essentially, it is because of additional energy costs, as well as the rise in the Canadian dollar, which hit our income levels like a shock wave. Why is that? Because our commodities are priced in American dollars. The currency conversion represents a drop in income for all sectors.

There is the same trend in Canada, but net income has dropped more rapidly. That can be seen on the table at the bottom of the page.

Based on that context, as I said earlier, on page 9 we have a comparison of the Canadian and the U.S. trends. On the first table on the right side of the page, the black line illustrates U.S. farm income from 1980 until today. We can see that the Americans are currently experiencing record net incomes while in Canada, we are also setting records, but we are going in the opposite direction.

We also calculated the net income minus inflation. We used Statistics Canada data: never have there been such low net incomes in Canada, when inflation is not taken into account. I believe that Statistics Canada began collecting this data in 1926. I would say that this situation is catastrophic. If we consider what is happening with our neighbour to the South, there is an even greater cause for concern.

The other table, directly under this one, is even more worrisome because it is more structural, in other words, it sets out the issues as they relate to the competitiveness of Canada's agricultural sector. The black line illustrates the U.S. farm debt from 1980 to the present day, in other words, the debt over assets. We can see that the Americans, after having experienced a crisis in the 1980s, have bounced back and are now in an unprecedented situation in terms of their debt. The U.S. businesses are in excellent financial health. In Canada, debt has reached a record level. This is also quite alarming. What happens when a net income crisis continues year after year? Farms go further into debt, which has enormous ramifications in terms of our competitiveness.

What does the vertical red line mean? It coincides with the change in the vision or approach to Canadian agricultural policy in the mid-90s, when a decision was made to let market forces apply and structural elements in our agricultural policy were dismantled. The results were far from positive for agricultural producers, in fact, it was quite the opposite. On that, I support what Mr. Friesen said earlier: it involves more than simply increasing subsidies or whatever, we need an agricultural policy that will give some leverage to the agricultural sector—I repeat, agricultural sector—so that the farms can regain their financial health.

The graph in the lower left-hand corner shows the trends in working capital ratio. There has been a rapid drop in Canada, whereas in the United States, there was a dip in 2002 but there was an immediate correction. There again, their situation is much rosier.

The UPA has worked closely with the Canadian Federation of Agriculture and other provincial members in order to find a solution by developing a strategy to improve the net income. The UPA wholeheartedly subscribes to the positions expressed by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture.

What we were asking for, essentially—and I would like to thank the minister for the decision that he made a few weeks ago—is the re-establishment of a business risk management component which would make the program more predictable and improve farm management.

As to our other objective, if we want to change the trend that I spoke of earlier, then it is essential to have federal funding for provincial programs so that each province can then adopt its own strategies to re-establish profitability and acquire more market share. As Mr. Friesen said, these strategies can vary according to each province.

We would like a return to livestock insurance for diseased animals. Moreover, we need a better strategy to manage catastrophes, which can be quite damaging. Current programs do not work well for managing catastrophes because that was never their intended purpose.

I will give you a specific example that involves Quebec, namely, the golden nematode. Some farms have been hard hit; their crops were completely wiped out. The existing program known as CAIS worked well for some farms but was of absolutely no help to others. This led to a feeling of unfairness and frustration among farmers. Of course, we must recognize that supply management can be used to manage risk.

My conclusion can be found on page 11 of our brief. If farms are to become profitable once again, then it is essential to have companion programs and to reinvest in provincial programs so that strategies can be devised. That is the only way that we will make it. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Merci beaucoup.

Mr. Wells, your presentation, please.

[Stewart Wells, President, National Farmers Union]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members, for this opportunity to be here to represent farm families across the country who are voluntary members of the National Farmers Union.

We support much of the analysis that was just given by our colleagues from the UPA. Much of it is very similar to our own analysis of the current situation.

I want to start by using a phrase that people have probably heard too much lately, and that is “climate change”, but I'm talking about the financial climate change that has really come into place when we're talking about farm incomes across the country.

In climate change terms, we've been through the five hottest years we've ever had in farm income, which means the five worst years we've ever had for net farm income in the country. This is coming on the heels of the previous 15 years, which were really negative years for farmers across the country.

We have distributed one page that has two graphs on it. In a nutshell, what the top graph is showing is that, over the past 20 years, Canadian farmers have created a farm gate wealth of two-thirds of a trillion dollars. That's not the retail value; that's the value that farmers sold that production for, the farm gate value. For that work, the farmers have kept exactly zero. The net income out of that two-thirds of a trillion dollars is zero.

What we are worried has happened, though, coming out of the 1990s, is that there were a series of business risk management programs developed as a result of the statistics that came out of the 1970s and 1980s. Our concern is that we think there have been programs developed to deal with the situation from the 1970s and 1980s, but not the situation that we've gotten ourselves into in the 1990s, and now the first five years that we've just come through.

Leading up to that period, in the 1970s and 1980s, when we first started to hear about things like the NISA program in the very late 1980s, it was still generally accepted that farm incomes were cyclical. They went down, but yes, they always came back and went up again.

Between 1945 and 1985, there was this tremendous range of farm incomes, but they were always positive and were always somewhere between $10,000 and $30,000, on average, right across the country. But that changed, starting in about 1985. They started this tremendous, almost constant, downturn. So that cycle that farmers used to be in disappeared. What we were left with, though, was still the generation of programs that were geared, tailor-made, to that cycle, but the cycle has disappeared.

That's the context we're starting from, and one of our concerns right at the moment is that in some quarters there seems to not be an acceptance that there's a farm income crisis. We don't have to go very far to find groups that will say in public that there is no farm income crisis. This is tradition now. We've had it for 20 years. Farmers shouldn't expect farm income, because they haven't had it for 20 years, and there are still farmers there. As long as they can find one farmer anywhere in the country who is still paying the bills, they say, well, that guy must be a good manager, and for all the rest, there's something wrong with their operations. So the first thing, I guess, that the National Farmers Union would be looking for from the committee is the acceptance that there actually is a net farm income crisis.

That brings us to the issue of the business risk management programs, and the way we're looking at it is that there are two ways of setting up those programs. There is a marketplace-funded business risk management program, and Mr. Friesen already alluded to the fact that supply management would fit into that category. We also see organizations, institutions like the Canadian Wheat Board, fitting into a business risk management plan that gets more money from the marketplace and distributes that money to the farmers. That's marketplace money that's business risk management programming.

Then there's the taxpayers' side--the $4 billion or $5 billion that has been transferred to taxpayers through the various business risk management programs.

We're thinking about the solution, and Mr. Friesen used the term “companion programs”. We call it more a suite of programs. There isn't one magic bullet that's going to turn this around. There are many programs that all have to be used. It wasn't one incident that created the farm income crisis for farmers.

If we want to look at the players around the farmers, a lot of them have been doing very well--the input suppliers, handlers, and retailers. It's not that we think they should make zero; we think they should make a profit and a decent return on investment. But if they can do that, why shouldn't the farmers be able to make a decent return on investment?

Gradually, over the last 20 years, we've seen farmers as a group essentially being nibbled to death by ducks, because every single player is just taking a little bit more out of the system--a few more percent here and there. Regulatory changes have occurred that add cost to farmers' business. It's just a little bit here and a little bit there, and over time we've seen the reduction to zero net farm income.

The solution to this is an integrated suite of programs that needs to be designed with a heavy reliance on cost of production programming. We say that because the margins on the farms have been reduced to such a level now that if the cost of production money isn't there quickly, the farmer gets behind the eight ball and can never catch up. If a payment comes from some program that was installed three years ago, it's just not going to help that farmer maintain and be able to pay the bills.

I'll close on the note that it's not fair or reasonable to think that the different provincial jurisdictions across the country can afford a 60-40 split on decent programming, on real business risk management programming. And it's not fair or appropriate for the federal government to unilaterally put in place programs without consultation with different provincial jurisdictions and then just expect that the jurisdiction will pick up 40% of the cost.

Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you, Mr. Wells.

We're going to do five-minute rounds, and we'll kick it off with Mr. Steckle.

[Paul Steckle, Liberal, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Thank you very much, gentlemen.

We have met on many occasions and discussed the same subject matter. I'm going to lead off in a little different direction. We're not going to get into details today, because we've worked on them for the 14 years I've been here and I don't think we're one bit closer than we were then.

I'm just wondering if it's time to start thinking about whether we need to have 10 different ministers of agriculture in Canada, and that we need one. That's an idea you might ponder. You might not want to give me the answer today, but think about it.

We know there are different treasuries in this country. We're trying to talk about fiscal imbalance. We're trying to transfer dollars from the rich to the have-nots, and it'll never be enough. Maybe we need to look at food security as a matter of national security. If we looked at it in that context and eliminated the provinces in terms of their responsiveness to agriculture, we would probably have even more money for agriculture, and at least we would know whose ox was being gored, or whose ox should be gored. Right now it's blame, blame, blame. One blames one level of government for it and the other blames the other level of government. I think we're really at a stalemate.

Quebec and Ontario have put forward a concept of business risk management. We had market revenue that provinces enjoyed. I haven't yet had a farmer tell me they didn't think market revenue was a good program. So there was a program designed to mimic the risk management program we had a number of years ago. But we don't find agreement across this country on implementation of that kind of bill.

How do you as farm leaders see it? As your representative politicians, we're hearing the same old story. Now there's a move to get rid of the Wheat Board. What's next? The supply managed sector?

I have to wonder what the farm leadership commitment to agriculture is. I know you have a job to do, but so do we. I think it's time we started wrestling this thing to the ground and saying, listen, this is where we need to go.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Friesen, I just ask that everybody keep the responses brief because we are in five-minute rounds.

[Bob Friesen]

We have two issues in front of us. One is to create the kind of policy environment in which farmers can be profitable. Farmers are business people, yet we don't have policy competitive with, say, the U.S. They're out-competing us with policy, so we need to create a policy environment in which farmers can be profitable. We need to move faster on the whole biofuels initiative; let's move more quickly on that. Let's get something in place that will actually work for farmers and work for every level in the sector.

Then we also have the developing programs that will sustain farmers through an income crisis or through low prices. You've mentioned the market revenue insurance program; that's exactly why we're saying we should bring back companion programs so that provinces can do some of that. Saskatchewan might do something else to address declining margins. Ontario and Quebec have said they like their risk management programs. B.C. might do something, say, for disaster preparedness, because they went through AI, avian influenza. That gives the ability for provinces to develop something specific that will fill some of the gaps that are still around a core CAIS program.

[Paul Steckle, Liberal, Huron—Bruce, ON]

That's the reason.... In the U.S., they have the U.S. farm bill. They don't have every state competing one against the other; in Canada we do. We're going to have that as long as we have the competing provinces representing various programs. Various farmers are going to get various handouts.

Quebec deals with the farmers on a different level than Ontario does, and they've done much better over the last five years than Ontario farmers have, for certain.

The United States doesn't have 50 different agricultural programs across the country. I think we'd better have a serious look at some of this stuff.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Go ahead, Monsieur Bilodeau.

[Denis Bilodeau]

This is a big country. There is considerable regional disparity from one region to the next. This disparity affects agriculture, since each area of the country is different. These differences can be quite marked, and the crops and needs are varied.

We are asking the federal government to recognize these differences with flexible programs that, through a global intervention strategy, will help to sustain farm incomes and make them more secure. We agree on the idea, but when it comes to the global strategy, we must be able to harmonize our programs and be flexible enough to address the regional characteristics of the producers. If these demands cannot be made within our regions, it will be difficult to do so at a federal level, with a country-wide approach.

In Quebec, we have developed a collective marketing approach which allows us to maximize our income. We strive to adjust our production to the market; we try to work out some type of arrangement with our producers and our distributors so that we can have a share of what the consumer regularly spends on food.

We are trying to get the best possible share for the producers. When that share falls short, support programs must pick up the slack. Their aim is to support farm income during critical times. That is what we are seeking in our programs in Quebec, that is what we want the federal government to recognize. We want to be part of a federal program that will give us enough flexibility to meet the needs of our regions.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Merci. Thank you, Paul. Your time has expired.

Monsieur Gaudet is next.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon gentlemen. I have a simple question. Instead of talking about a Minister of Agriculture, I think we should talk about 1 federal agricultural minister and 10 provincial agriculture ministers. An amount totalling $4.5 billion has been allocated since 2005, but I don't think every province got what it was expecting. That might be the crux of the issue.

I have nothing against asking the federal government to give $1 billion to a western province for disaster relief, for a flood or a wind storm or a drought. Last year, in Quebec, the potato problem cost $500 million. The federal government should also provide compensation in cases such as that one.

The programs should be extended, but each province should be aware of what the federal government will be providing in terms of subsidies. It would mean putting all of the money into a pot to be distributed when things turn bad. Then the federal government would no longer have to provide subsidies. What do you think of that?

[Gilbert Lavoie]

What you are referring to is special aid. There are two components. That type of aid is provided when there is a sustained drop in income. We realize that these are large amounts, and I believe that farmers, not only in Quebec but throughout Canada, are aware of their importance. However, even if this money were provided on an ad hoc basis, rather than through a predictable and structured program, that would not reverse the trend. Small cheques are sent to every producer, but the individual amount doesn't provide much help. That is why we are asking for funds to be reinjected into provincial programs, based on our historic market shares, or on the type of agriculture that we have, so that these funds can be structured and redirected. We want the money to be used for restructuring and to reverse the net income trends. Producers become very frustrated when they realize that they are not getting their provincial share, when huge amounts have been invested.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Wells.

[Stewart Wells]

I agree with those comments. I think my response is really the same to both that question and the previous question.

In my mind, there has been too much unilateral action by the federal government and not enough cooperation, whether it's the provincial ministers of agriculture or the farm organizations involved. When you only have one person or a small group of people making decisions to fit the whole country, it's not going to be effective and it's not going to be timely.

If there is one criticism I have of this system, it wouldn't necessarily be to cut out the provincial ministers of agriculture. It would be to persuade the federal government to act in a more cooperative fashion with everybody involved.

In 2001 we had the Liberal administration announcing APF. I believe the announcement was made through a press release, and the first most people saw of it was in the newspapers. It's not a very good way to start generating farm programs that you hope are going to work for farmers across the country.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Friesen.

[Bob Friesen]

First of all, nine out of ten provinces in Canada have a surplus budget. There's no reason they couldn't contribute to the announcement that was made about two weeks ago.

Secondly, specifically to the potato problem in Quebec, this is exactly why we support the work this committee has started on looking at other components we can add to a core CAIS program to fill some of the gaps that we see are still there.

One is the catastrophic disaster component that the minister has instructed the department to work on. It is a disaster program that would address things such as rebuilding the infrastructure.

In cases of extreme disaster, such as the potato industry in Quebec, which basically no longer exists and probably won't exist ever again, there would be something in place that CAIS wouldn't cover or the contributory top tier wouldn't cover. But it would be a disaster component that would help to rebuild the infrastructure and move the industry along.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Gaudet.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

I only have a brief question.

If this were to generate a surplus, then maybe we could counter the subsidies that the Americans are providing through their Farm Bill as well as the EU subsidies to their farmers. It is continuous. It is evident in what you showed us earlier. That could be a condition. The Canadian government could provide a certain amount. The money would come from the program, but then, it would continue, and you would have the fund to help our farmers.

I would like to know what you think about that.

[Denis Bilodeau]

We are aware that these are income stabilization programs. Our farmers want to make as much as they can from the market. When you apply a single rate to all of the crops, you miss the mark. Some farms are in dire straits. A small amount of money will have very little impact and will not improve their financial situation. Other farms that have an acceptable income cycle will also receive money, but that will only help them keep their heads above water or give them a little breathing space.

It is hard to accept because we acknowledge that the federal government is providing large sums of money. We would like to have even more, particularly if we compare these amounts to what the Americans are doing, but we know that an effort is being made in that area. Unfortunately, the impact on the farms is not obvious. That part is not being recognized. In recent years, there have been farms that were unable to make it, in spite of government aid. There is some help with the companion programs in Quebec, but it is not enough because the Quebec government cannot, on its own, completely support these programs.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you.

Merci.

Mr. Miller, you'll have five minutes, please.