Thank you, Chair.
Even though we're in P.E.I. and I'm from Saskatchewan, the issues are much the same. When we look at young farmers and trying to get young farmers into agriculture, a lot of them would say the same things, maybe about different commodities or different products, but much the same.
The one thing that was consistent, and I'm going to start off with this, was the 30-month-and-over cattle going to the U.S. That is a big problem, not just here but out west too, because if we want a packing industry, all of a sudden they're at $30 or $40 a head disadvantage to buy that cow, and more than likely that's heading back into Canada after it's been slaughtered and processed. So that's something we really need to look at addressing, especially considering the cow numbers in the U.S. are at all-time lows. I don't know if this problem is going to get any better. It can get worse. It might be good for the farmer over the short term, but long term I have some concerns.
That's one of the concerns I have with your processing plant you are talking about here. We tried to do that in Saskatchewan. We had a farmer-owned processing plant. When BSE hit, everybody was gung-ho to support it--yes, they needed it. We got it up and running, and as soon as things faded out and they could get a nickel higher somewhere else, guess what? They went somewhere else. And guess what? That plant closed.
What have you put in place to keep your plant viable through something like that?