Yes, some were certainly whipped and some just willingly chose to ignore their farmers, which is....
But the second topic that came up with farmers in my riding—again, despite all the challenges that we do face in the industry right now—was, in the words of many of my farmers, “that crazy Bill C-474”, and it came up quite frequently. Of course, I've got a lot of canola growers in my area. Canola is an industry that certainly has been a success story in our country, and one for which, by all accounts, the success wouldn't have been able to be there had something like this existed at the time. As I mentioned, I do have a lot of canola growers, and that's of course mainly due to the fact that there are a lot of guys who want to get out from under the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly. But that's another topic for another day as well.
Obviously, those farmers do recognize a lot of the loss potential that's there, certainly loss in terms of lost economic benefits and lost trade opportunities due to moving away from a science-based approach, lost opportunities for research and development, and on and on, that could occur under this bill if it were to pass.
My question is for Dr. Keller. You talked about the fact that Canada is a force in high-quality crops, and you cited some examples, such as hybrids, disease-resistant wheat, and insulin from GM yeast. Those are some of your examples. These are obviously some of the benefits that we've seen already from research and GMOs. You mentioned some upcoming innovations that we'll likely see--for example, drought tolerance improvements for human nutrition qualities. That obviously intrigues me. I'm excited to hear about the future and these future innovations and benefits that we can see on the horizon. I'd like to give you an opportunity to explain in some more detail some of the innovations that are being done right now in terms of Canadian research in GMs and some of those things that may be on the verge of coming to the market. Could you maybe explain in more detail some of the new possibilities and what their potential benefits might be to consumers, and also potential benefits, of course, to economic activity, particularly in the agriculture industry?