Thank you, Chair, honoured members, for inviting me here today. I am Beth McMahon, the director of the Canadian Organic Growers. This is Canada's oldest organic agriculture organization, which first started in 1975.
The Canadian Organic Growers enjoys a large and diverse membership, with more than 1,500 individuals and businesses across Canada across the value chain. We have four regional affiliates, ten chapters, and a quarterly magazine.
My position with COG is quite recent. However, for the past eight years I have been executive director of ACORN, the Atlantic Canadian Organic Regional Network, which is the organic association for Atlantic Canada. I'm also a member of Agriculture Canada's Organic Value Chain Roundtable and a director of SOIL, Canada's national sustainable farm apprenticeship program.
In working with the organic sector, what has struck me the most is the innovation and motivation of producers and processors. Although spread across commodities, scales, and geography, this sector is enthusiastic about sharing information, encouraging growth, and celebrating the success of others. I believe these core values are leading to financial gains, adaptation, renewal capacity, and further innovations, a positive feedback loop that we're encouraging.
I've personally witnessed the intentional information sharing and leadership in livestock, horticulture, and various companies and commodities.
Our sector has created producer networks for sharing information on seed production, grains, and community-supported agriculture. Encouraging these types of communication initiatives is a very cost-effective way to facilitate industry collaboration and problem sharing.
In no other part of our agriculture are the new entrant rates as strong as what we are now seeing in organic production. We know that renewal in the general farming sector is of great concern, so supporting organic production can be an important part of the solution for supporting the whole base of agriculture. Many of our new entrants do not come from farm backgrounds and require significant training and support.
Access to funding for new entrants is still a challenge I hear about on a regular basis. With many entering into the field with hefty student loans, even with production experience and solid business plans, farm loan boards and commercial banks are not interested in supporting start-ups. Creativity and determination abound in our sector, which is why we're seeing strong growth in the community-supported agriculture models, but greater access to capital is required for scaling up.
Even at smaller scales, the values of organic agriculture are important to rural economies, succession options, and farm knowledge transfer. The surge in interest in organic farming is also providing current producers with new sources of labour and aspiring farmers with real-life education. Through on-farm training initiatives like CRAFT in Ontario and SOIL, which is across Canada, aspiring farmers are placed on farms for a full growing season. Last year in Canada there were over 200 farm apprentices, which led some to start their own operations, others as skilled labour for future years, and yet others who realize farming just isn't for them. Many farm hosts are playing an important role of extension agent in their communities, filling part of the large gap that government used to lead. Our organization believes there would be considerable value in supporting more people on the ground who can provide technical organic guidance to new producers, those in transition, as well as those who are looking to adapt their operations to more lucrative markets.
Certainly one of the most efficient methods of increasing knowledge sharing and collaboration are in-person meetings and conferences. As organizer of one of Canada's largest agricultural conferences, I can personally vouch for how incredibly important they are for encouraging innovation and adaptability.
Ten days ago we had more than 500 people at the ACORN conference in Dartmouth, with hundreds coming from out of province. What you may find interesting is that most participants were not organic, but everyone was there to learn something from more than 40 workshops in soil fertility, pasture management, new crops, marketing, financial profitability, and more. There were also side meetings for the Maritime Hop Growers Cooperative, a new provincial food distribution initiative, and another meeting for the development of the Nova Scotia organic sector strategic plan. No one left this conference without new ideas, energy, and enthusiasm after what was a pretty dismal growing year. We achieved all of this without large government grants, just a few sponsors and registration fees, as well as the volunteer efforts of more than 70 people.
This is an example of how our organic associations are providing value to the entire agricultural sector. Run without the revenues of check-offs and mandatory memberships, organic farmers, businesses, and supporters generously provide funding to keep our organizations operating. Human resources are also spread thin, with fewer than ten full-time staff working in various organic organizations in Canada. As identified in the GF2 discussion paper, support for industry associations is critical, and this is very true in the organic sector. Our heavy reliance on volunteer contributions does not provide much stability. We need greater support and investment to build our core human resources, ensuring the infrastructure to share knowledge, lessons learned, avoid duplication, and increase our general capacity for our sector's competitiveness.
In the past three years there have been thousands of hours volunteered by organic stakeholders participating in the consensus-based methods of the Canadian Organic Standards, which is managed by the Canadian General Standards Council and the Canadian Organic Products Regulations. This investment is one of the reasons that Canada is now so well regarded internationally for its organic products. This is the only reason we were able to achieve a bilateral trade agreement with both the U.S. and EU, which is a first in the world. This places Canada in a very competitive position since these two regions represent 96% of the organic marketplace. It is essential to review and maintain our organic standards in order to protect these important trade agreements and develop others.
Already, there are many outstanding issues to review in the standard, but no means to do so. We need government to commit to the maintenance of the standard. This is a key priority for the sector and critical to our adaptability. Volunteers can't do it alone.
The organic sector is in a strong position of growth. With more than $2.6 billion in sales in Canada last year, the consumer appetite for organic products is undeniable. Despite having 4,000 primary producers and 1,200 processors, demand still exceeds production, so most of that $2.6-billion sales figure represents imported product, and this is an incredible opportunity for our organic sector.
Organic production and processing is providing the consumer with an assurance that what they are buying was grown without synthetic pesticides or genetically modified seeds, processed without artificial additives, and raised in humane conditions. This requires significant record-keeping for traceability, on-site inspection, labour, and expense. Organic producers and processors must also have systems in place to avoid contamination, planting buffer zones and adding extra standard operating procedures for processors and abattoirs. The organic sector goes the extra mile to meet consumer expectations, but it's not enough.
Currently we're facing the threat of increased GM contamination. If GM alfalfa is registered, our buffer zones won't block these tiny seeds, which can travel with pollinators for several miles. Alfalfa is also the first transgenic perennial crop grown to tolerate glyphosate, which also presents a long-term risk to any producer who wishes to avoid GM crops. There are no programs to compensate organic producers for lost market premiums or, more seriously, lost certification due to GM and environmental contamination.
Increasing organic production and exports benefits Canadian agriculture as a whole, contributing to Canada's brand position: "Quality Is in Our Nature". Canada will always be in a difficult position to remain globally competitive on price. However, we can excel in quality and trust, and organics is an excellent fit in this model. Most of the work that we are engaged in has broad applications to all of agriculture, from the scientific research on low-input systems, to new farmer training and knowledge transfer, to building Canada's reputation for high-quality foods.
I would urge this committee to ensure that your support for organic is clear in the Growing Forward 2 parameters and negotiations with the provinces, thereby ensuring the continued growth of this innovative sector across Canada.
Thank you.