Thank you very much, Chair.
Thank you for your excellent statements. Those were really informative statements, and they aligned nicely with what we heard at our last meeting. You have some really positive messages.
One of them, I think, is that farmers have a vested interest in the welfare of their animals. This is not always apparent in some of the articles we read, where the farmer is sometimes pitted against his or her own animals. That's just not the reality.
The other thing that was particularly interesting, Tina, was your presentation on science, and that science very much has a role to play here; that is, providing scientific data and feedback into the system to establish these standards.
You did raise a point about changes to the department in terms of government scientists, and it's true that the changes in the department will affect some government scientists, but what I can say is that we have tried to focus those changes in areas where industry can take a much stronger leadership role.
I will just give an example, regarding what Mike had said and what we heard from the Egg Farmers of Canada at our last meeting. There are very strong sectors here in Canada. They are part of clusters, or have cluster applications. There's a matching of 50-50 funding. We're still involved, of course, in the funding, but that industry takes the lead is quite appropriate, I think, and that they match government funding is quite appropriate too. Of course, we have other funding initiatives, like NFACC, as well.
So while it's true that government scientists are affected or will be affected by some of these changes, as I say, we have tried to focus them in areas where industry is well equipped to take on a stronger leadership role.
Let me just ask my first question about that.
Mike, I think you said animal welfare is in the top three priorities, for example, of what a cluster might do. Could you perhaps enlighten us on a few of the initiatives that the cluster would see as high priorities in terms of animal welfare?