On rail service review expectations, the pulse industry was part of the coalition of rail shippers. I think there was really an unprecedented level of collaboration between automotive, fertilizer, chemical, forestry products, and agriculture to all come to an agreement. There was an unprecedented level of unanimity in addressing the shared concerns.
That coalition of rail shippers went so far as to even make suggested specific wording changes as part of the legislation. Our expectations were fairly clearly outlined in what the coalition of rail shippers put forward. You could spend a lot of time going into that.
On the value-added side, there are dynamic and huge international food markets. Many companies have announced plans to do things, and sometimes they move ahead on time and sometimes they are delayed. One thing I would point out, because I am not involved at a company level, so I don't have that sort of inside information, is the story of the level of knowledge you have to have to make a smart investment.
One thing I would like to cite is the milling work we are doing at the Canadian International Grains Institute with the pulse industry. That work is of huge interest to the food companies. I am fortunate enough to visit food companies in China, the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. If you're going to make an investment in a processing company or look at including pulses in a range of foods, you have to understand a whole lot of food science things. In the pulse industry, we are really trying to move from a product that was sold on the basis of colour, size, and shape to one that is now an ingredient that has to have functional characteristics.
My advice, when I'm asked by some companies, is that I don't think we have the full amount of information to fully understand where the new opportunities are. Yes, we have a lot of investment going into fractionation plants, and there's huge demand. But I think there are also opportunities in flour milling, which is a lower-cost processing technology. We have had food companies say that they know they can do it with fractionated product, which is quite high in price relative to what it might be if they could do it with flour.
There's a lot of work going on that I think is a prerequisite to really understanding in our industry the kind of investment that should be made, because you are looking for what is cost-effective.
On the bonding side, Pulse Canada has left comments on bonding to the grower groups and to the trade. When I spoke to the committee last time, I was in my Canadian Special Crops Association hat.
As I understand the amendments, grain companies would be required to carry insurance to insure payment to farmers. It is a mandatory program. It just moves from bonding to insurance. That's my understanding of what the Grain Commission has proposed.