Thank you very much, Chair.
First of all, I'd like to thank our witnesses for being here. This is an important issue.
One thing I would like to draw attention to is that although we're talking about SRM, really we're talking about the competitiveness of our livestock sector. I want to underscore that we're trying to take the initiative as a government to help the livestock sector at many different levels. For example, one of the ones that has been in the news recently is the $50 million to help our slaughterhouses here in Canada. There was an announcement made in Winnipeg earlier this week, and of course our friends at Colbex are also benefiting from this. We got $500 million through AgriFlex for innovation and marketing.
One thing important to note is that one thing adding to the competitiveness of our livestock sector is the opening of foreign markets. Minister Ritz has been very successful in opening foreign markets--for example, Hong Kong, Jordan, Saudi Arabia. He is going to visit China in the near future and has visited Russia just recently. All of this helps our beef industry.
One thing about SRM is that we have to be careful not to take it out of context. There was a lot of discussion and consultation with industry before the SRM regulations were put into effect. One of the driving forces behind it was the BSE crisis that we had in Canada. The world basically was shutting its borders to Canadian beef. Canada had to prove that it was taking BSE seriously, and I don't mean just with words but with real actions and programs, and more importantly with processes that would show other countries that we were taking BSE seriously. This was part of that solution, part of showing the world that we take this matter seriously. Measures such as this, although I understand there are concerns, have helped open the borders that I just mentioned. They look to Canada and say that we are taking this seriously, that we have made progress, that they like the processes we have in place. I think that initiatives such as this have helped, and they're paying dividends now.
Mr. Wildeman mentioned just before he left that one of the things that would be helpful is that there be a committee, so that the government is studying this matter and looking into it to find solutions. There is a committee. It has been together now for six to eight weeks and is doing consultation. It's in its initial stages. Of course, we want the committee to work as quickly as possible, but the aim of the committee is to fully understand what you're telling the committee today, and other factors as well, and to look for solutions.
I just want to let the committee and Canadians know that there is a committee that has been put together to work on this.
The other thing I want to mention, and this is backtracking a little bit, is that my understanding is that when industry was consulted about SRM, they in fact supported much of what is in the regulations today. I understand that the consequences may not have been understood well at the time, but I want to make the point that it was a collaborative effort and that it was to help open foreign borders, which of course is very beneficial to our livestock sector.
Talking about opening borders and the impact it has had, I'd like to ask Mr. Dessureault of Levinoff-Colbex about how international markets are helping his company.