Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thanks, Minister, for being here and for listening to our committee's concerns. It's really good to see that the fall economic statement reflects some of the studies we've done. We've looked at non-tariff barriers. There's funding for non-tariff barriers there. We've talked about improving our trade. There's money for trade commissioners.
I'm always interested in innovation, as you know. We never have a conversation where it doesn't come up. There's discovery science. The University of Guelph is a great partner of ours, as well as OMAFRA, in Guelph.
I was recently making an announcement on your behalf down in Leamington, with Competitive Green Technologies, using science from the University of Guelph. They were taking coffee grounds from McDonald's across Canada and making headlight inserts for Ford Motor Company, and then shipping them to Mexico for moulding that would come back for assembly. The types of investments that we're making in science are really game-changing and quite often hard to recognize as agricultural products, especially when you get into bioplastics and some of the nanotechnologies.
You've seen a lot of innovation over your 30 years serving in Parliament. Could you comment on how we're trying to keep in front of the game here, how we're trying to get to where the puck is going in terms of investment in innovation?