Agriculture Committee on March 7th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Good morning, everyone.

Welcome to meeting number 71 of the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we are resuming our study of the agricultural and agrifood products supply chain in regards to grains and oilseeds.

Joining us today is Lucy Sharratt, the coordinator of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network. We also have Gordon Harrison from the Canada Grains Council, and Franck Groeneweg from the Grain Growers of Canada. Welcome.

We are up against a bit of a time schedule so we are going to hear the presentations. You may hear bells ring, and we'll make a decision from there how we proceed.

Whoever wants to take the first section, please begin.

[Franck Groeneweg, Director, Grain Growers of Canada]

I could get started if you want. That would be good.

Thank you for the opportunity to present to the Standing Committee on Agriculture today.

I'm Franck Groeneweg. I farm at Edgeley, Saskatchewan. It's about half an hour northeast of Regina, Saskatchewan.

I grew up in France on a farm south of Paris. I spent six years in the U.S. producing corn and soybeans. Ten years ago my wife, Kari, and I bought a farm in Saskatchewan. We have expanded it to our current 7,500 acres. We use the best practices and technologies possible to produce top quality, nutritious, and affordable crops in the most environmentally sustainable manner. But foremost we do it for our family—Luke, Julia, Emma, and Solange—making sure our land is better when they get it than when we received it.

I'm a director with Grain Growers of Canada. We do national policy development and represent tens of thousands of successful farmers. Our members are from the pulse and oilseeds producers groups across Canada.

To ensure that our products can continue to be exported, it is imperative that countries around the world adopt a low-level presence policy. Grain Growers commend the work of this government in moving forward to develop our low-level presence policy. Canada has the chance to be a leader and help direct the tone of the policy around the world, and Grain Growers of Canada fully supports this.

The lack of low-level presence policy in export markets has led to their closure when unapproved events show up. Zero tolerance is unachievable, and I will explain why in the next few slides.

An unapproved event such as the Roundup Ready gene is one that is not approved in the country of import but is approved in the country of export. If it has been approved for use as food, feed, and for environmental release—especially in a place like Canada, which has a strong science-based regulatory system—then its presence is not a food safety issue, but rather a technical barrier to trade that some countries are using to protect their own industries or to cater to public perception.

The world's population continues to grow, and we will need a way to feed them. Biotechnologies have directly contributed to increase soil, air, and water health and quality. On my farm they have allowed me to be more productive at the same time, which is truly a win-win situation. That is why the technology is so rapidly adopted around the world. Truthfully, my farming brothers in France can only wish they would have access to the same science-based technologies we have in Canada.

In 2011 alone, 16.7 million farmers grew biotech crops on almost 400 million acres in 29 countries. It is important we have the proper policies in place to ensure incidents of low-level presence are dealt with in a realistic manner and that doesn't result in trade impediments or restriction. In brief, the use of GMO grain has been highly beneficial both to farmers and to the marketplace.

On our farm we grow canola, wheat, peas, durum, flax, faba beans, and industrial hemp. Here you can see zero tillage seeding equipment. The main reason for this variety of crops is environmental diversity. This rotation ensures each crop advantages the following crop by the qualities it brings to the land in water and nutrient use efficiency, but also weak competition. The proper use of rotation benefits higher and more sustainable production.

But even with the best weed control, we still have volunteer growth, and each crop can become a weed for the next crop. There is never 100% weed control so it is reasonable to have a few plants escape and be harvested. This diversity is the start of an inevitable contamination unless of course we were to advocate for monoculture, which would be a huge step backwards.

As you can see by this extensive list, prior to moving off the farm to be sold, the grain moves around the farm a lot, which provides numerous instances where mixing can occur. Cleanliness is so important. Still, it is impossible to prevent mixing of some seeds, but being diligent about cleanliness helps to minimize mixing.

Here you can see our harvesting equipment full of wheat. We switch from crop to crop, which can happen multiple times during harvest, as each field does not mature at the same rate. One might have had an extra rain shower in the last few days. We can switch crops nearly daily, so we do spend some time to reasonably clean our equipment to limit contamination. Yet the more time we spend in cleaning, the less time there is for harvest. This picture shows close to $2 million worth of equipment. With only 45 to 60 days to harvest, too much time spent cleaning will quickly teach what the laws of diminishing returns are.

From the combine to the grain truck to the auger to the grain bin, even new bins have gaps where some crop can stay lodged. Here is a bin floor, where you can sweep; you can do the best you can, but there are always a few seeds left.

Here's a truck unloading at the grain elevator. The next truck might be a truck full of canola or wheat or oats or other crop, and so on. Sure, the platform can be swept, but it is never 100%, even with the best care. It does not to be absolute also, yet some of our export markets can test to levels of 1 part per billion. Now to put it in perspective, see this truck on the picture there? It has about 40 tonnes of grain. See in this little jar here. There are nine seeds of nutritious, heart-healthy genetically modified canola seeds, safe for my kids to eat. Testing to the one part per billion would detect the presence of the equivalent of these nine seeds in this grain truck. When these get into a rail car, which more than likely was also not 100% clean, they continue and keep going into the handling system, where there's also more chance for contamination. I know, as a farmer, taking all the best precautions, that I cannot eliminate contamination.

Most farmers are more aware of the need for separation and cleanliness. In the last 20 years, many have signed contracts for specific varieties in production. For example, there's a bakery in the U.K. that does specific contracts and needs very close cleaning and segregation. But still with that, there is some need for some standards of low-level presence.

One of the keys to success is good management and cleanliness. Another is to understand the financial and trade issues: if something is rejected in a boat somewhere in an export position, it can cost the farmers a lot of money when the price of that commodity drops overnight. That can be as costly as $50,000, $100,000 on a given farm. Third would be to train your staff in cleanliness, cleanliness, and more cleanliness. Fourth, we can start with pure seeds, preferably certified seeds.

As efficient as we can be, we can improve in these areas, but some mixing is inevitable.

As you can tell, I'm passionate about my job as a food provider. In Canada we are export oriented. We export over 70% of our production. We generate wealth. Agriculture is a forerunner in our rural economies. We really need this kind of a low-level presence policy to continue to export and make our farms worth handing over to the next generation.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Ms. Sharratt, please.

[Lucy Sharratt, Coordinator, Canadian Biotechnology Action Network]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm speaking on behalf of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network, which is a network of 18 organizations, and we have participated in the consultations on low-level presence where invited.

The adoption of the LLP policy would establish Canada as the first country in the world to accept imports contaminated with levels of GM foods that have not been approved by our own regulatory agencies.

I thought firstly I'd like to ask the question what LLP does achieve. Firstly the LLP policy does not achieve the stated trade goal. The proposed LLP policy will not accomplish the stated goal of minimizing disruption to Canadian exports. The LLP policy would govern imports to Canada.

The rationale for adopting this LLP policy rests on the hope that other countries will follow Canada's example and adopt similar LLP policies. We do not know, however, that this will be the result. Canada's acceptance of LLP does not necessarily bring us any closer to this goal.

Rather than improving the position of Canada's commodities in the international marketplace, LLP has a high potential to undermine Canada's international reputation regarding both food safety regulation and the integrity of our food system. This is because through LLP we are actively inviting contamination of our food system without domestic regulatory oversight.

Secondly, LLP will change domestic GM food safety regulation. LLP would change the way GM foods are regulated in Canada. The policy proposal asks Canadians to accept GM foods as safe even when Health Canada has not fully evaluated them and approved them as safe. LLP asks all Canadians to accept GM foods as safe even where Health Canada has not approved those GM foods as safe for human consumption. LLP also asks Canadians to trust the regulatory processes of other countries. LLP asks all Canadians to agree to the assumption that at a low dose, unapproved GM foods are safe.

What are the implications? In our analysis, LLP will sacrifice health and safety for elusive trade goals.

From a public health and safety perspective, there's no justification for allowing the import of foods contaminated with products that have not been fully evaluated by Health Canada. LLP will undermine consumer trust in Canada's food safety regulation.

The LLP policy introduces further uncertainty for Canadians in relation to what GM foods are in the food system. It creates further complexity for Canadians in understanding how GM foods are regulated and by whom. The LLP policy would further obscure the place of GM foods in the Canadian food system and would aggravate the current problem of the lack of GM food labelling. The policy asks all Canadians to accept the potential of unknown GM contamination in every food item on the shelf.

LLP will compromise Canada's science-based regulation of GM foods. The regulatory system for GM crops and foods in Canada has consistently been described as science based. Here, however, scientific oversight over GM foods is being removed in relation to the action level proposal and seriously reduced—in an as yet undefined way—in relation to the threshold level proposal. LLP is trade-based regulation that would irrevocably compromise Canada’s claim to science-based regulation of GM foods.

In the interest of time I thought I would perhaps condense a little bit of what I have presented on paper to look at the specific implications of the action level and the threshold level, which, with the existing approval system for GM foods in Health Canada, essentially create three tiers of regulation for GM foods, where of course the action level allows for a small amount of contamination.

The implications are really that the action level is not based on science. It's based on an assumption of safety relating to the science that has been assessed by another country. This is not science that rests inside Health Canada, and certainly there's no science behind a decision to choose one action level over another, 1% over another. The action level asks Canadian consumers to trust the regulatory systems of other countries.

In relation to the threshold level that allows for a higher level of contamination, higher than the action level, determined apparently by what's achievable in the industry, this would be allowed after a “Canadian LLP risk assessment”.

The proposal for a threshold level in our analysis further complicates the LLP proposal and further compromises Canada's claim to science-based regulation of GM foods. The proposal that a threshold level could be allowed after a “Canadian LLP risk assessment” begs the question, what is that risk assessment and how does it differ from the current Health Canada approval process for GM foods?

The proposal to establish threshold levels introduces a new second-tier approval process for GM foods based on an as yet undefined process and criteria. The fact that this assessment process is not defined brings home the point that the LLP policy is not science based.

Threshold levels would severely undermine the ability of a great portion of the Canadian public to trust Canadian regulation for food safety and for GM food safety in particular. Evaluation of GM food safety is already a process that is largely hidden from the Canadian public, and the proposal for threshold levels via a Canadian LLP risk assessment would further complicate and obscure the regulation of GM foods on the shelves.

In summary, our analysis is that the policy does not secure the stated goal of easing trade of Canadian exports. Rather, it has serious implications for the future of Canadian food safety regulation and Canadian trust in such regulation. Acceptance of LLP would undermine Canada’s international reputation for food safety. It would seriously compromise Canada’s claim to science-based regulation of GM foods, both in international markets and domestically. It would further engender consumer distrust of GM food safety regulation and leave the government with little ground to build or maintain that trust. This policy is extremely vulnerable from a public health and safety perspective, and this vulnerability extends to the biotechnology industry itself, which seeks a positive public perception for its products based on an appeal for Canadians to trust in government regulation. I would suggest that there are a number of stakeholders and actors in the food system that similarly rely on this same appeal.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

The bells have just started ringing in the House. I'm looking for direction from the committee on whether we would like to come back after the vote, which would probably be around 12 o'clock.

Frank.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

I'm just wondering, given that there will be a bus downstairs to take us all over, if we might not hear from Mr. Harrison, then head over, and return for questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

My advice is that the committee has to end with this ringing of the bells. That's the direction we're getting from the whip's office from all sides.

So we'll return immediately after the vote. Is everybody is comfortable with that? I, too, would like to hear Mr. Harrison, and we'll have about a half hour to 45 minutes.

To our witnesses, I appreciate your indulgence. We are interested in what you have to say and are prepared to listen if you can abide with us.

We'll suspend until noon, or after the vote.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Welcome back. Thank you for your patience.

Mr. Harrison, we're going to move to you for your comments. Then we'll go to questions from the committee.

Please begin.

[Gordon Harrison, Member, Canada Grains Council, and President, Canadian National Millers' Association]

Thank you very much, and thank you for the opportunity to appear.

I'm here today on behalf of the Canada Grains Council. My position in the industry is as president of the Canadian National Millers' Association, which is Canada's national association of cereal grain processing companies and plants. The Grains Council, as I think you will know, is the national federation of grain industry organizations. The council represents seed developers and growers, producer organizations across the country, railways, grain-handling and transportation companies, research foundations, ports, and others who are participants in the supply chain.

I'd like to comment at the outset that the Canada Grains Council has been an advocate of and supports fully the establishment of a low-level presence policy. The Grains Council and its members see the establishment of a low-level presence policy as being enabling, as being a strategic objective that has to be realized if we want to preserve and enhance market access and make it predictable market access globally.

So the Grains Council is very much about and in favour of establishing a low-level presence policy.

The trade goals that the LLP policy brings to mind are not elusive but have been already achieved in the past. In some cases, the circumstances we're dealing with that are changing, such as the aforementioned ability and the moving ability of science and scientific methods to detect ever-lower levels of substances, are changing the environment. The overarching purpose of the LLP policy that the Canada Grains Council supports is that we would like to see Canada set a valuable precedent for other jurisdictions to follow.

What the council believes to be at risk, as a participant in an international grain trade coalition, is the ad hoc adoption of standards for low-level presence that are never going to be practicably achievable. In the absence of internationally recognized standards that can be met by the participants in the international grain trade, we are going to have unpredictable market access.

The LLP policy, about a decade in the making, as released and shared for comment in recent months, is vital to Canada's grain industry and supply chain. That is why the Canada Grains Council endorses it.

The LLP policy indeed is new, but it does not alter the pre-market evaluation requirements or the pre-market evaluation process for genetically engineered traits; it does not change that. We acknowledge at the Grains Council that if it takes a lot of resources on the part of Health Canada or CFIA to manage the LLP policy, there's a potential for those resources to take away from the business-as-usual pre-market evaluation process. This is a comment that we submitted online to the federal government.

The subject of recognizing or accepting the safety assessments of other jurisdictions is pretty important. This is something we already do in Canadian regulation of drugs and will do increasingly in the future. We need to support and negotiate mutual recognition agreements with other jurisdictions in food-producing and exporting countries. We need to recognize the competence of their regulatory agencies and would expect their countries and agencies to respect the competence of our agencies. Mutual recognition agreements are going to have growing importance, and in doing business internationally in the future, we will have no alternative but to recognize, multilaterally or even unilaterally, the competence of regulators in other jurisdictions.

Part and parcel of the low-level presence policy, which can be reviewed in detail, if you haven't done this already, is that we're talking about a policy that applies to genetic traits that have been approved for unrestricted, 100% food use in other jurisdictions—and by competent jurisdictions: part and parcel of the policy is the identification of countries whose regulatory agencies are deemed and considered by Canada to be competent. LLP policy as proposed does not apply to unapproved events.

With those over-arching comments, here's what the Canada Grains Council has to say about the proposed policy. As I said, we expect it to be enabling. We think it's a strategic step that has to be taken.

We would cautiously advocate that Canada lead the parade in this. We think that if all else fails, once we have a policy that we believe is actionable, comprehensive, clearly understood, and capable of being implemented without unforeseen consequences to anybody in the grain supply chain, perhaps Canada ought to go first.

Clearly, it's ideal that Canada be among a number of trading partners who adopt a policy that can be implemented in all of those countries; this would be more strategic in terms of facilitating trade and market access. We would see a precedent like this as being strategic. But “a precedent only if necessary”, I would say.

We've commented to the consultation team that the proposed action levels of 0.1% or 0.2% are pretty low. Those are below the levels one would normally have to be working with in the management of co-mingling of commodities in domestic and international grain trade. Additionally, those levels are near the limit of quantification—not detection, but quantification—and so there are analytical uncertainties. We have thus commented that it has to be at least 0.2% plus an allowance for analytical uncertainty. Again, we've noted that this applies to 100% food-use approvals.

We've also commented that the policy as drafted to date needs more work. I think all parties that would be affected by this policy need to have a better understanding of what the whole thing looks like. How will we implement this? What kinds of oversight and monitoring will we have? What are the sampling protocols? What are the analytical methods?

These are questions that have been asked of the federal parties by a number of stakeholders. To date, these details aren't there. It's not that they're not susceptible of being outlined, because we know what works and what doesn't in terms of sampling and analytical methods.

We also need to know what means are at the disposal of industry that would allow industry to restore compliance. If the policy is implemented and there is an action level established, and then a threshold level—which is actually a maximum limit—and you are outside of the maximum limit, what are you allowed to do to restore compliance, if you have in your possession an imported commodity that you can't re-export? You paid a great deal of money for it, you paid the transportation to get it in position, so what are you allowed to do to restore compliance?

We've also recommended that the action level not be cumulative. That is, each genetic trait would have its own action level; they would not be lumped together.

The final comment I would make—this is the last comment we have provided via the Grains Council's submission—is that no bulk handling system, no channeling system, no identity-preserved system can meet such low levels. Although the policy states that LLP thresholds will be higher, it's important to note that these need to be established as soon as possible so that governments and industry internationally fully understand the difference between an action level and a threshold.

I'll leave it at that. If there are any questions that I can't answer today—I would observe that this submission was prepared by a committee with various industry backgrounds—I'd be happy to take them under advisement from the clerk and respond with written replies.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you very much.

Madame Raynault, welcome.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Ms. Sharratt, thank you for your patience while we were voting.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Does everyone have an earpiece on?

Good. I just wanted to make sure.

Go ahead, please.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Ms. Sharratt, you said that GMO crops should only be approved for planting in Canada after the economic consequences of contamination have been evaluated.

Could you explain to us why these evaluations are important?

[Lucy Sharratt]

Thank you.

The issue of LLP arises because we're growing genetically modified crops that have not been approved in our export markets.

For some crops in particular, this is a very serious problem. It begs the question of whether there are perhaps remedies we can take here to address the LLP problem, if you will, which is recognizing the existing reality in our export markets for X, Y, and Z crops, and stopping or halting or providing a moratorium if the economic consequences of contamination were extreme, as would be the case with alfalfa, for example.

It also provides the potential for consultation with farmers, which as yet has no place in the regulatory system.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

In previous testimony, it was mentioned that zero risk—undesirable attributes such as chemical residues, GMO, etc.—in the supply chain is not feasible.

How do you respond to that argument?

[Lucy Sharratt]

Every crop is different, so there's a different potential with each crop.

Before genetically engineered crop were introduced in Canada, we had no discussion as to the potential for contamination. We're having that discussion now, and it's better late than never. Zero tolerance is the international standard. It's the policy reality in Canada and in other countries, in our export markets. The question really needs to be asked what zero tolerance means. For health and safety it might be necessary. In terms of some crops, also, it's unavoidable. For example, you would have to make sure that there's no Roundup Ready alfalfa on the market if you're to ensure there's no contamination. We know this is the case for some crops.

There may be the ability to manage contamination in some crops, and that's what the threshold level proposes. The LLP policy recognizes contamination as a problem and actually proposes looking at the biology of crops and what the industry can manage in terms of contamination. That's a discussion we should have had 20 years ago. But I think zero tolerance is what is expected right now from many consumers, certainly.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Do you think that organic production and GMO can coexist?

[Lucy Sharratt]

They can't, in that organic farmers risk losing their livelihood and certification if there's contamination from genetic engineering and genetically modified seeds. In addition, organic consumers expect a product that is not contaminated with genetic modification. So we have this situation where the issue of contamination is a burden that's borne by organic farmers, organic consumers, and also by farmers who are exporting to countries where these GM traits are not approved. Again, that's a question that needs to be debated. The organic sector needs to be valued for what it provides and its ecological services and products to consumers.

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

In your presentation, you said that the action level proposed was not based on science, but on an assumption of safety.

Could you elaborate on that?

[Lucy Sharratt]

It's very clear that the action level requires an assumption of safety based on an evaluation of another country's regulatory system. If Health Canada says that the U.S. or Chinese system is acceptable, that's a generalized assessment based on the Codex international principles, which are, firstly, also open to interpretation. For example, Canada implements the Codex guidelines differently from the European Union in at least one case. We also see the issue where Canada could evaluate a particular country as having an acceptable regulatory regime. But of course on a case-by-case basis we could see that the approval of a particular GM product is compromised in that country because of political interference or any number of issues. We would not necessarily see that happening.

So we're actually asking Canadians to trust in a generalized way the regulatory system of another country as to what we're allowing into our country through LLP. Will that be in perpetuity, or will there be a review every five years or 10 years? Is there a public notice that provides information to Canadians on which countries we agree have a regulatory system that's safe enough to assume a low level of safety through an action level? There are all kinds of questions about that. Is the action level based on someone else's science, or another country's evaluation of corporate science? We've already asked Canadians to trust Health Canada in relation to GM food safety. Now we're saying that Health Canada actually doesn't have a role to play in this particular consumption of these GM foods.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Lemieux.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thanks for your contributions to this excellent subject of discussion.

I want to ask Lucy a few questions about low-level presence, particularly in terms of zero tolerance.

Do you really feel that zero tolerance on anything is realistic and achievable?

[Lucy Sharratt]

When we're looking at LLP, zero tolerance is our current policy, because Health Canada approves products before we consume them. That's really the essential matter. If zero tolerance isn't possible, an assessment of safety is still required.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Sure, but what I'm saying is that even at zero tolerance there is really in a sense a low-level presence, because the presence just might not be detectable.

Let's say that current testing can test to one part per 100 million or one part per billion. If there were one part per 10 billion, testing might not be able to pick that up. So I think it's quite valid to say that zero tolerance is just not realistic, and especially not when you're looking at the supply chain for agricultural products.

I'm wondering whether you would agree that an absolute zero tolerance is probably unrealistic. I don't think we can find that anywhere in any thing.

[Lucy Sharratt]

I think zero tolerance could be realistic. It would just be implemented via another policy, which is that if zero tolerance isn't practical in X, Y, and Z cases, then that GM crop is a problem.