Does that mean I've just lost 20 minutes?
Let me introduce myself. I am the associate dean of research for the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at the University of Manitoba. My background is certainly in animal science. I'm also a rural resident and hail from this part of Canada, the Interlake region. So I have a vested interest, most definitely, from a personal as well as a career perspective.
I'm going to start by saying that, fundamentally, when we're talking about agriculture, we're talking about the management of a terrestrial or land-based ecosystem to produce and generate income from commodities or value-added food, biofuel, or other non-food products. When we look at our structure, there are many situations—and you've heard of many already—where we have research or educational or policy and technology transfer institutions that maybe are not as integrated as they might be by definition.
I'm going to focus on three areas in which I think we can make a difference and on which I will maybe solicit some comment and support. The first is a request to consider support—and this isn't always in the form of money, but also in terms of organizational structure and human resources—for long-term and multidisciplinary approaches to deal with the problems we have in the agrifood and agricultural sector.
We're dealing with a managed ecosystem, and we understand both the need to develop technologies and management practices that generate economic sustainability for all levels of the sector and also the need to deal with our environment, both to reduce risk with situations such as climate change as well as to ensure a high-quality sustainable environment. This is for two reasons, really. One is to ensure that our public is behind us, because without public support, anything we request or try to do is likely to fail. Second, there are real opportunities through the agrifood sector—you've already heard of some of them today—to enhance our environment. This is a strength that we have in Canada.
I'm not going to go through the length of the document, but I would like to say that you've heard about Lake Winnipeg and the many issues we in the province of Manitoba have at the watershed level relating, in part, to agricultural practices. You are also aware that central Canada or prairie Canada is going to be very vulnerable to changes that we might see in the future with respect to climate change. This is an area of opportunity from the perspective of new growth in the agriculture sector—maybe not so much on the food side, but certainly on the energy and the bio-product sides. We will very quickly see operations that are producing commodities for multiple purposes—and the standards for those commodities, depending on their purpose, may be quite different.
So we have complex issues to deal with, both from a social perspective and environmental perspective, as well as from a policy perspective when it comes to things like trade.
At the University of Manitoba, we've chosen to focus on a few areas. One of them is through the development of the National Centre for Livestock and the Environment. This centre brings together disciplines from many faculties, such as science, engineering, medicine, and agriculture and food sciences, for the purpose of identifying solutions and best management practices relating particularly to intensive animal agriculture.
This initiative has garnered a tremendous amount of support, about $13.5 million from two levels of government, as well as from industry. In the main, this initiative, which really began in 2004 and whose research programs started in 2006, has garnered good support and a great deal of interest. But it's very clear to me that we still see most of that interest at two levels. One is the short term, because we're looking for value in the short term, as most of our funding agencies are very focused on seeing value in a short-term timeframe.
Secondly, we see things from a very disciplinary area. For example, those who would normally support initiatives in soil or land management might be very reluctant to move into water management or into animal production systems. As a result, we see barriers that slow down the work that could be done by scientists and other collaborators in the area of agriculture and the environment.
To sum that one up, I would simply like to say that as a recommendation, I think Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada needs to take a leadership role--I know it has to some extent, but even more so--in engaging a range of federal departments, for example Environment, Health Canada, Fisheries and Oceans, and even, within its own mandate, CFIA and PFRA, to invest more strongly in long-term, multi-disciplinary research. These efforts will result in common goals being achieved more quickly between those organizations or those departments. It will also encourage the training of post-graduate people in the multi-disciplinary areas, and this is critical if we're going to be able to deal with the complex issues that agriculture is facing down the road--to have that kind of expertise available.
The second thing I'm going to address has to do with declining enrolment in agriculture faculties. This is impacting our industry again. Just in our university, we had more than three positions identified for every graduate from the diploma, the degree, and masters and PhD programs. We have an industry that is coming to us and saying that they can no longer steal from anyone else because there is nobody to steal from, or that there's enough to steal from, but everybody's stakes are higher and there are no people available.
The second thing that happens with declining enrolments at Canadian faculties of agriculture is that their stake and their ability to garner support within their own university administrations starts to decline. Renewal of academic staff who are doing research, new investment into programs so that what we teach students is current, some of those things start to fall behind, and we have a wheel of decline. For a nation that has as much of its income and as many of its acres and people associated with agriculture as we do, I think that bodes poorly.
At the University of Manitoba we have taken some steps to try to reverse this, going to, in particular in our case, China and India to attract students with the hope that some of them will stay in Canada. We have co-op job training programs in conjunction with industry. We have just recently, through Immigration Canada, brought someone in so that we can go through accreditation programs for immigrants who already have training from other countries and may simply need upgrading. We have probably the best--of any faculty in our university--scholarships and bursaries for students who come into our faculty.
And finally, we've taken the steps in the last few years to build an education centre at one of our research stations in conjunction with the National Centre for Livestock and the Environment to increase education opportunities for a public that is very interested in food from a health and social perspective, with the hope that there is a greater understanding of what the agrifood and agriculture industry is about, but also as an opportunity to demonstrate the excellent career opportunities that our youth have if they choose this field.
In conclusion on that, I would recommend that there is a role the federal government and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada can play in helping us increase interest by our youth in this area--a role in terms of ensuring that we have recruitment and education programming for our public and for our youth so that we encourage and provide a vehicle by which they can learn of the opportunities. That might be through, again, investment in such initiatives as our Glenlea Farm Education Centre, but there may also be other ones available.
Just for your information, this is a $4 million initiative. At this point we have about $2.5 million, actually more than that, pulled together. Again, industry has been our main supporter--they see the value--but also recently the province.
My last one is around the development of the Canadian agrifood research centre, focused on the grains. We know well that the federal government has major institutions of the grain sector here in Winnipeg. We have a number of companies that have headquarters here in the grain handling, seed, and commodity areas. We have major biofuel investment in the province.
With the declining infrastructure and the inability to expand in some of these federal facilities, I think there's an opportunity, through Smartpark at the University of Manitoba, to bring these interests together and to build a world class centre that is focused on the grain industry and the future opportunities of the industry.
That would be my recommendation for the third area.