Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank all the witnesses for appearing today and making their presentation.
I think it is very timely that we are discussing where we are headed as a country and what the future holds for us. One thing that's constant in agriculture is that it's always changing. We've experienced over the last number of years, probably, really the last 25 years, that the pendulum has been swinging into these mergers and acquisitions and the consolidation in the processing industry, which has had a dramatic impact on us. It's something that's happening not just in Canada; it's also happening around the world.
Looking at our long-term profitability from the standpoint of being farmers and looking at how we fit into what's happening on a global scale, we still have to be competitive. In western Canada we are major exporters of food grains, of livestock, and we have to have open markets to access those opportunities for increased revenues and increased profitability.
I'm a cattle producer and my father is an organic farmer on his crop side. The livestock side isn't, but the crop side is, and it works quite well with the forage rotation that we operate. By choice, I decided to enter public life, not for the off-farm income, that's for sure, because being up here in Ottawa is not conducive to running a good farm operation. It was about coming here to help influence public policy and legislation for the betterment of agriculture.
The one thing, I think, that has been touched on is the whole idea of captive supply in the cattle industry. I'm a cow-calf operator. I'm concerned about what's happening there. I also realize the fact that the packers are also buyers of my calves, so I'm following quite closely what is happening in the States with the discussion that Congress is going through. I think we need to make a differentiation between what the packers own versus what they contract, though. I think we still want to have the opportunity of cattle producers to have those risk management tools that are available commercially, whether it's through contracts or otherwise, and I'm sure the same is true for other commodities. But it's nice to have that contract and to know what you're going to get at the end of the growing season rather than rolling the dice and seeing what happens.
I want to get some ideas from the witnesses.
How do we do this so that we still have the risk management capabilities that are available commercially to us and improve the competitive position that we want to have as farmers, the increased profitability? I know one of the comments that the NFU made is to block mergers. The XL Beef Inc. one is a good example. If we were to block that merger, Tyson would have just walked away from Brooks. Then we're down to one player, really, and we're losing major capacity in the industry. So the question becomes, what do we do in those situations? Where do we find new players and people to come in to pick up the slack that's going to occur in the marketplace?
I just throw that open. Perhaps, Mr. Foster, you want to kick off first, and then the NFU and our friends from the organic industry. I'd be interested to hear what happened.