Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am delighted to be here this morning presenting in front of you and having the opportunity to discuss the questions that will arise in the next hour or so.
I'll give you a little bit of background. I am from northeastern Alberta, north of St. Paul, from a mixed farm. We have a 4,000-head feedlot and 6,000—last year we seeded 7,000—acres of crop. I work with my four younger sisters, and we pretty much run the farm. In a few weeks' time, I'll be going back home to run the tractor 24/7.
As far as my educational background goes, I have been a student here at Olds College for the past four years. Actually, at the end of this month, I will be happy to complete my applied agriculture business degree. The applied degree gave me the opportunity for the last 10 months or so to work with Meyers Norris Penny, which is an accounting business advisory group, and with that, to be involved in the ag sector and take the initiative to find out how many of our clients did apply for the Canadian farm family options program or were eligible to apply. As I said in Ottawa, having 120 applicants who collected over $1 million, and 85% of them didn't know about it, kind of puts the whole education and knowing about the utilization of these programs behind.
Some of the other industry involvement I have and am currently involved in is the Agriculture and Food Council. I guess I am sitting here in front of you today representing the Canadian Young Farmers, where I was recently elected a member-at-large.
When we think about different problems or issues we face in the industry as young farmers, the number one thing, of course, is how we get into the farm. How do we do the farm transition? What it comes down to is cash. We don't have the cashflow. To transition those assets on our side is our number one biggest problem, because of industry constraints and the fluctuations in markets today—just the main challenges.
I do appreciate and very much recognize the importance and the potential impact that a lot of these government programs can have on any farmer. The farm family options program is a wonderful program. The CASS program—the Canadian agricultural skills service program—is a wonderful program. The only challenge is that the farmers don't know. And it's not like they don't have time to know. It's up to them to step up and say, “Hey”.
I very much agree with Mr. Robert Saik's comments on the process with the environmental farm plan. I've done it for numerous clients of Meyers Norris Penny as well as for our own personal farm. The process is very timely. We're very willing to pay, willing to put up the money, willing to do the additional record keeping. As young farmers, we definitely realize that management, running your farm as a business, is becoming of increasingly important value to your farm. It's not just producing a commodity anymore, and the more you produce the more you make. It's the exact opposite. It's how efficient you can be and the people you know and the connections you're able to make.
I'd just like to reiterate what I said in Ottawa. I think one of the most important things we can work on is making partnerships between the government and Agri-Trends and Meyers Norris Penny, because we have the access, we have the connection to all the producers located Canada-wide. I think it's partnership that can definitely add value and add awareness and education to these programs.
I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what this APF2 is going to bring us in the next few years.
As a young farmer I am very excited. We're definitely trying to be as innovative and efficient as we can. It's our passion to produce food for the world and be involved with different commodity groups and whatnot.
I look forward to spending the next time with you.
Thanks very much.