Thank you.
Humane Society International/Canada is very pleased to be presenting here today as part of Growing Forward 2. This presentation will highlight the incredible changes that have taken place in recent years thanks to growing consumer demands for improvements in animal welfare in agriculture.
Indeed, given the worldwide trends toward higher welfare standards for animals in agriculture and the increasing role these standards are playing in trade relations and corporate policies, it is our hope that this area will be given the full attention of the committee in this and all future agricultural policy reviews.
HSI/Canada is the Canadian office of Humane Society International, the largest animal protection organization in the world, representing over 12 million members globally, including tens of thousands in Canada. Our organization works on a broad variety of issues, including wildlife protection, companion animal welfare, farm animal welfare, and emergency response.
In September 2011, HSI/Canada assisted the Government of Quebec in carrying out the largest seizure of dogs from a commercial breeder in Canadian history. In the wake of this seizure we were inundated with expressions of support from all over Canada. We received thousands of calls from compassionate individuals wanting to know what they could do to make sure such cruelty never happened again—