I apologize.
Because it's a single program, because it can be made to look complex, it is easy for it to fall off the table. But it is a single program that can have a profound effect on operations, on input costs. The fact is all of the issues that have been put against it, and the so called trade-offs of GROU, harmonization, NAFTA labelling, those things are false trade-offs. It is not a matter of either we have harmonization, NAFTA labelling, or we get competition from generics now. We can have both, and both issues of harmonization have been priorities of the government from day one. This is not something that PMRA and CropLife Canada served up as an alternative to getting rid of GROU. They already existed long before they decided to try to review GROU. We shouldn't be put into a false situation.
On the animal health side, by the way, it's much more severe. I know a farm family from Ontario who had a large hog operation--these weren't just small guys on the edge of survival--and they lost everything in their hog operation. He showed me receipts that show his price for a vaccine called RespiSure was $20,000 a year more than what he would have paid an hour south of the border. On the vaccines issue it is a bit more iffy, but there is no allowance right now for competition in that sector. These are huge costs for hog producers, and they're not insignificant for cattle people, who right now are not riding a high wave either.
I would like to end with a very sincere observation, and I hope you will ask me some questions about perhaps some of the things you've heard that have made you think it's not a very serious issue. The sincere observation is that the future of farming is under construction. This committee can decide whether or not it's going to be a house that farmers can live in, or a factory that produces profits for shareholders in mostly other places. Both options have their pluses and minuses. But either you're on the construction crew, or make way for the bulldozer and do it consciously.
I sincerely thank this committee for taking up this issue. I sincerely hope you will pepper me with the hardest and toughest questions you can on this issue, because it truly matters probably more than any one single thing you can do. My president, Mr. Mann, will talk to you about fertilizer at your leisure, but it's going to be a heck of a lot harder nut to crack. This is something where the tools are there. The tools are simple. They are recognized. They have sound science behind them. We've used them before and the sky hasn't fallen in. It is something you can actually do, not just study or talk about.
Thank you, members.