The Safe Food for Canadians Act is an important advancement. CFIA was certainly delighted with the opportunity to modernize the statutes with the support of this committee.
What the Safe Food for Canadians Act does is provide to the CFIA important authorities. They allow us to strengthen and modernize our food safety approaches and to take advantage of some best practices that other countries have begun to employ. Through the authorities that strengthen inspector powers and broaden our ability to have consequences for behaviours that are misaligned with our food safety intent, the agency will be able, in our view, to more aggressively and more quickly respond to issues when they emerge. Examples are the authorities that relate to the traceability of food and the enhanced inspection powers the act provides.
As an agency, we have become seized with the act having received royal assent. In terms of the work we now must do at the regulatory end, we will be working with regulated parties, consumer organizations, and other stakeholders in a consultative process to elaborate on the regulations that will support the intent expressed in the act so that we can fully take advantage of the innovations the Safe Food for Canadians Act presents.