Yes.
Thank you for your testimony.
Mr. Dungate, in your presentation, you talked about poultry imports from the United States, and that topic was discussed at great length during the Annual General Assembly of the Éleveurs de volailles du Québec. This general assembly took place last week or the previous week. It was held very recently.
There is some concern in particular about these US imports. You also mentioned Brazil. According to the Quebec federation, American poultry imports have increased annually by about 25% for the past eight years. That is a tremendous amount!
We are told that the chicken coming in from the United States will be processed here and supposedly returned to the United States. However, we are wondering whether or not this chicken really is sent back to the United States. It is difficult to know exactly what happens with respect to transportation.
As for the Annual General Assembly of the Quebec Poultry Producers' Association, which was attended by the Honorouble Jean-Pierre Blackburn, Minister of State (Agriculture), I would like you to explain what he said exactly. Indeed, the minister was quoted in a media article on the file, where he said that the government was now looking at proteins rather than weight as that enabled them to have better control over the quantity of chicken imported from the United States.
I do not know whether or not you understand exactly what he meant, but I would like to hear your explanation. Obviously we should be asking him the question. That being said, I would like to understand exactly what that would mean.
When we talk about competitiveness, we must obviously deal with this situation even though we are protected by the supply management system. Today we can see that, in many countries, they are starting to take a serious look at the applications of the supply management system. However, in many cases, and not so long ago, there was an attempt to make it seem as though this supply management system no longer existed, to help with competitiveness, although there are still countries that want it.
However, there has been a reversal of this trend towards a supply management system. I am pointing this out because this is an interesting fact.
Despite the protection that you enjoy, there are some aspects that may be very worrisome for the competitiveness of your sector.