Evidence of meeting #21 for Agriculture and Agri-Food in the 41st Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pork.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Well, if it's a secret, you don't have to tell me, but I'm just wondering if, as a comparison amount, as a percentage, it is as much as we contribute. Is it more or is it less?
President, Canada Pork International
Okay. It's less than what the government contributes, but the contribution comes not only from the Pork Council. It also comes from the Meat Council.
President, Canada Pork International
We have contributions from the Canadian Pork Council and the Canadian Meat Council, so that's from the packers, the traders, and the producers. The core activities are paid for by both councils, with 75% of our export market development activities covered by the fund. But the core money is private.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Okay.
How effective have the market access secretariat and its position been for your group in pursuing new markets and growing existing markets?
President, Canada Pork International
You have to remember that the creation of the secretariat was at our request, ours and the cattlemen's—
President, Canada Pork International
—so we were very pleased when it was announced. We have to give them time to establish, but let me tell you that the relationship we have had with the government in the last year and a half has been very good when it comes to dealing with market access. They have established priorities and they are quite effective. The dialogue is there. It's much more transparent than it used to be, so we're quite pleased with the work of the secretariat, knowing that they are still at the early beginning, but from the way it's going, we can't complain at all.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Okay. So with the $17 million that was contributed at the height of the pork crisis a couple of years ago, in your numbers here it's estimated...you have in your numbers for the benefits of federal financial assistance that the money has helped grow your pie by 5% to 30%. Is there a way that you can actually drill down a little as the years or the months move by? Is it closer to 5% or closer to 30%? I think that's a pretty big range, and it would be helpful to know what the success is of the program. If you could drill it down a little...?
President, Canada Pork International
It's 5% for some companies and 30% for others, so what we use is a conservative estimate of 10%, but it varies.
I'll give you an example. Many of our people said that if it had not been for CPI and for the federal government work we've done in Russia.... Russia is our third largest market now. We used to have all kinds of problems. At one time, we had only one plant that was allowed to export to Russia. That was less than a year and a half ago. Now all our plants are approved again, so it varies. Use the figure of 10%, which is the conservative figure. But it varies from 5% to 30% for individual companies.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
When you are working with our Canadian embassies in other countries—let's say Vietnam or whatever country you want to use—how effective or useful are they in helping you reach your desired results? Are they useful, or do they not provide any use at all to you?
President, Canada Pork International
Oh no, we are very active with the embassies. It depends on the market. We have been in Japan for 40 years, and over the years the embassy has been very good in helping us identify people who could do promotions with us. But with the new free trade agreement that is in the works with Japan, or that could happen, we'll need the embassy because it has to tell us what's going on and what is the intent of the Japanese government.
In some other markets.... It depends on the market. In a new market like Vietnam, definitely we'll need the embassies because we don't know the distributors and we don't know who the players are. It depends on the level of development and how comfortable and good we are with the current trade partners.
Conservative
Ben Lobb Conservative Huron—Bruce, ON
Moving forward, I've heard from different farm groups that it's one thing to gain market access, but it's quite another thing to educate the agencies or the businesses in those markets to have trust in Canadian products, and also, if there is a bump in the road, that they don't panic and close their borders.
Is there something you would like to see moving forward in Growing Forward 2, not only to help market but also once you've achieved that market to continue with education, trust, and reliability? How would you see that moving forward?
President, Canada Pork International
That's exactly what we're doing right now. That is exactly what CPI is doing. Once we have the access, we are the ones who get in there and do the education work and everything. The key thing is that when you have market access, at times it is more difficult to maintain your access than to open a new market. You have seen it with the beef industry.
Growing Forward was for us the best, through that funding. Because we had that four-year funding, it really helped us to have that strategy to go after each market. Now we have a fabulous relationship with Russia, which we never had before, because of that, because we had that stability of funding that allowed us to do it.
Jean Rousseau NDP Compton—Stanstead, QC
Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
My questions are for Mr. Coutu and Mr. Pomerleau.
Mr. Coutu, with your expertise in international markets, what do you think the assets of Quebec and Canadian products are? I mention Quebec products because I am a member from Quebec and I would really like to know how our products stand out globally. What could the government do to help our producers stand out more on the international market?
Chief Executive Officer, Agri-Food Export Group Quebec - Canada
The asset of Quebec products is their originality and creativity. SIAL Canada allows Canadian manufacturers to demonstrate that. Journalists from all four corners of the world are often astonished at what we manage to do in Quebec when it comes to products and innovations.
Can the government do more? Certainly, when you're from Canada, you have a
clean passport.
It's recognized around the world. Our country is recognized for the safety of food made with respect for the environment. Our factories use
stainless steel.
I think that
the program branding Canada,
that the Export Group participates in a lot must also be maintained. It's important to say abroad that these are Canadian products.
Chief Executive Officer, Agri-Food Export Group Quebec - Canada
It's essential.
President, Canada Pork International
I share their opinion. It's the Canada brand that we are selling first and foremost. For example, if people in Japan initially have a choice between a product from China and the same product from Canada, they may pick our product because we have a very good image. So the Canada brand is important.
Second, it is up to us to tell our own story. The history of Canadian pork is all about our differentiation on the international market, and we have a very good story to tell. This is why our businesses have a premium that other countries and suppliers don't have, especially in Japan where we are very close to consumers.
NDP
Jean Rousseau NDP Compton—Stanstead, QC
Right.
I would now like to talk about new markets, emerging markets. Mr. Pomerleau, you mentioned Russia and South Korea, among other places. I will also put this question to Mr. Coutu.
Is there the possibility of increasing market shares on the international market? What sort of marketing are you doing? You just spoke about the differentiation that we could offer producers. There truly are emerging markets in which we could export even more to the world.
NDP
Jean Rousseau NDP Compton—Stanstead, QC
There's still room in markets such as Japan. We are targeting high-quality products. There is no point trying to have a price war with the Americans because we'll lose. Our products are better anyway, so why try to compete over price?
As for the emerging markets, there's a market that no one has mentioned yet, and that's India. In our case, it can represent a whole market. In fact, it's oriented toward high-end products. We export fresh pork to China, Singapore and Hong Kong. All we need to do is get new veterinary certificates for Russia.
Unfortunately in the case of South Korea, we're losing our market shares there. In one year, we made $300 million in sales. The largest Korean retailer told us that we had the best product and that he would pay us a premium for that. Unfortunately, that won't be enough because the difference in tariff with the Americans is too high and the Koreans will have to let us go.
