Agriculture Committee on Jan. 31st, 2019

[Tom Rosser]

I guess I'd just say as a general comment that in terms of the way the government measures the representativeness of its workforce, it does take into account the demographic composition of the community.

[Bev Shipley]

Okay.

[Tom Rosser]

In a community that has a higher proportion of indigenous people, for example, we would take that into account in terms of figuring out whether or not they were under-represented in our workforce.

[Bev Shipley]

I've been involved, not only municipally, but here for 13 years. Municipally, there has been an issue of first nations in agriculture. The ability to have our young indigenous people continue with their education has always been an issue.

Could you tell me how many are going to agriculture colleges or universities? I'm going to be honest with you, today I've not heard of any. I've heard mainly about building a government structure. To me that's quite concerning. What are the local councils, the local elders and band members, doing to encourage and to show the need to get an education? We don't just need people at the top telling them what to do. We need these young people coming from the bottom so they know what to do.

Can you tell me how that's working in agriculture? Because in this day and age—and it doesn't matter what sector we're in—the significance of innovation, technology and business management is going to be key to their success. I think this is going to be a key component.

[Dr. Brian Gray]

I can't speak to the broad national numbers but I can give you a couple of examples locally.

We have a large research and development centre in Lethbridge, Alberta. Adjacent to that is the Blood Tribe First Nation. Part of our student recruitment initiative was looking where we have research centres adjacent to first nations. The children from the first nations can commute, and it's a short distance to our centre.

In Summerland, B.C. close to Penticton, our centre is literally surrounded by Penticton Indian Band. In Agassiz, our neighbour on two sides of our research farm is Seabird Island First Nation, and then I get back to the Blood Tribe. When we started this program, they had agricultural activities in all three of those first nations. We didn't have any students and very few staff from those first nations. We talked to the chiefs and council and they were interested. We included students in our recruitment program, but your point about education is very important.

By getting students already in the university system, we've already picked the low-hanging fruit. We need to know how we get the kids in the community interested in agriculture, or any science or technology from my bias, and that is through our students who are a part of our program—we call them ambassadors. They go back into the community and talk to their peers. We're not as young as them so they're more likely to listen to somebody who's closer to a peer. They go into the community and say here's this wonderful educational program. These are jobs.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Gray. I have to move on.

Mr. Poissant, you have six minutes.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to the witnesses. Their comments are very interesting.

In general, the big problem for farms is succession. I am wondering whether indigenous communities are experiencing the same problem? The average age of farmers is 57 or 58, but what is it for indigenous farmers?

[Tom Rosser]

Thank you for your question, Mr. Poissant. Unfortunately, I have no specific answer.

As Mr. Longfield noted. Canada's indigenous population is younger on average than the rest, and it is growing. That is one of the reasons why we believe that indigenous peoples could participate more in the agriculture and agri-food industry. It could be a solution to the labour shortage in the area.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Is there enough of a next generation on the existing farms? It must be somewhat similar to us, where farms are passed from father to son.

[Tom Rosser]

You are right to say that succession is a major challenge in agriculture. I can do some research to see whether there are any data comparing indigenous and non-indigenous farms. I do not have an exact answer at the moment, but we can check whether there are data on the matter and follow up with the clerk of the committee.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Okay.

Mr. Traverse, what are the most popular agricultural outputs? Is it livestock or crops? If agriculture were to be more diversified, what could the government do about it?

[Mervin Traverse]

It varies across the country. In the prairies they have a lot of cow-calf operations. In some of the communities, it's bison. They're still trying methods to be able to use them as an economic development opportunity, but there are barriers. There are no avenues for them to export, because they just don't have the knowledge for that capacity. In the east, there are communities that are trying blueberry operations, trying to meet the local markets, such as weekend farmers' markets. There are communities in Canada that have community gardens. They're trying to utilize those community gardens to be able to create revenue for their little operations and put back into their communities. These are very small farm ideas that they're trying.

As for husbandry, there are no huge operations in western Canada that I'm aware of. For the northern people, there are no facilities available for caribou in terms of the federal standards required for export purposes. These are some of the things that I'm aware of. There may be other ones that I'm just not aware of.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

If a packing plant were established for processing, would that be useful?

[Mervin Traverse]

Ideal would be indigenous plants—wild rice, for instance, or things that are natural to our lakes and that exist in the west and in regions like Ontario. Wild rice has been a very big factor, but there has never been a production plant. There were some in the prairies in the past, but they're no longer in operation.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Ms. Taylor, we are talking about federal programs. Do most provinces offer indigenous programs?

[Jane Taylor]

In the Canadian agricultural partnership, there are federal programs, but there are also provincial and territorial programs. Most or perhaps all provinces and territories have indigenous programs. As we told the committee, this is the first time this year that, across programs, there are federal programs specifically for indigenous people.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Okay, thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

That concludes this round of questions, but before I continue, I will ask a few questions, if I may.

We've now identified that quite a bit of land exists in the territories of the first nations. I'm curious; have we asked them what kind of agriculture they want there? Do they want the commercial type of agriculture that we have now, cereal and ranching and so on?

As well, we're talking about education. Have we made any attempts to capture the traditional knowledge and the traditional ways of growing and collecting food? We're talking about bison. We're talking about caribou. We're talking about plants like Labrador tea. Are we going in that direction? I think that's very important as well.

[Dr. Brian Gray]

I can address the second part of your question. Through our indigenous science liaison officer, we are working with communities that are interested in traditional agriculture, but as I said, for many of these there's the traditional knowledge but the practice might not be in place, or there could be communities that have traditional practice in place, but it's small.

We're working with them to find out what they are interested in. Do they want to grow? Do they want to build? Again, what we're doing is not a program, so it wouldn't be something in the programs branch, but it's something we're doing—kind of research and development—and if it works, then down the road it could lead to something that could be programmatic.

[Tom Rosser]

With respect to the first part of your question, Mr. Chair, I just want to note that we talked earlier about the pathfinder service we have, which is a type of concierge service to try to help indigenous people in communities navigate through not just our departmental programming but other programs and services available from other departments and other levels of government.

I think we noted as well in the discussion this morning that, of course, access to capital is a key barrier to participation. Part of the agriculture portfolio is Farm Credit Canada. I know they, at a community level, are working with indigenous communities, particularly those that have agricultural land in their possession, and are working with other indigenous financial institutions, the First Nations Bank and others, to try to find solutions to that problem.

The starting point for that dialogue is understanding what the communities' views, preferences and visions are for realizing the potential of agriculture in the community.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Elder Traverse, Mr. Gray, Mr. Rosser and Ms. Taylor, for being here with us today. It will certainly help us in our report.

We shall break. Let us be back in our seats in two minutes, for the second part.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Welcome back.

During the second hour of our meeting, we welcome Vincent Lévesque, the founder of the Agricultural Society for Indigenous Food Products, and Michel Gros Louis, its director.

Also, from Northern Farm Training Institute, we have Ms. Jackie Milne, President, by video conference.

We will start with a seven-minute opening statement.

Mr. Gros Louis, you have the floor.

[Michel Gros Louis, Director, Agricultural Society for Indigenous Food Products]

Kwe. My name is Michel Gros Louis and I am a Huron-Wendat from Wendake.

Let me introduce you to the Agricultural Society for Indigenous Food Products (ASIFP), which is based in Quebec and was founded in 2014. However, first of all, I would like to briefly go over my professional background. I worked for 30 years in agri-food, science and technology at the Research and Development Centre in Saint-Hyacinthe. I retired in 2016. In 2018, I was appointed executive director. Over the past few years, I have worked as a facilitator in indigenous agri-food in Quebec. A report was published in 2013 on indigenous agriculture and agri-food production in Quebec. That document, which has been distributed, described the situation in Quebec. I cannot speak for the other provinces.

That was after indigenous agriculture was introduced during those years. I was wondering why Quebec was not part of that program. There was one project in British Columbia, one in Ontario and one in Saskatchewan. I was called upon to help. I was asked to paint a portrait of indigenous agriculture in Quebec, if there was such a thing. In 1910 in Kahnawake there were 1000 farmers, but 100 years later, in 2010, there were only five or six. This means that the situation has deteriorated in Quebec. There have been many problems, but absolutely no support.

The purpose of ASIFP is to promote local products. There are many products. In terms of supporting scientific research and innovation in indigenous local products, we encouraged a project with the Mohawks on hominy and corn soup. There is also the Labrador tea, of course, which has been the subject of a research and innovation project at the Research and Development Centre. Vincent Lévesque will talk about this at greater length. I am very interested in birch water, which has enormous potential. There are also berries, cloudberries. There are many products.

There was also the “Three Sisters” project, which took place between 2015 and 2018 and which was sponsored by ASIFP with Agriculture Canada's Science and Technology Branch. A report published in the spring of 2018 is entitled “Three Sisters value-chain: characterization of attributes and functionalities of aboriginal corn, squash and bean varieties, preservation of genetic material and prefeasibility of new culture models”. I have also been hired in recent years to inventory the collection of traditional seeds from the Iroquois who cultivated the last species. The purpose of the Agriculture Canada project was to protect World Heritage seeds under the Paris Agreement.

I will now discuss assistance to indigenous farmers and agri-food in collaboration with the government to create programs. The situation for programs is very difficult in Quebec. There is virtually no support. An indigenous farmer lost his 2,000 apple trees. He was 35 years and two months old and the age limit to be eligible for this program was 35. Many of the problems we face are raised in the report. There are many problems. We receive no help, regardless of the area. This is also the case for farmers. There have been a lot of losses.

Charly Jacob, from Kahnawake, is a founding member. Three nations keep the traditional seeds. They have a project that deals with traditional corn for soup. Julie Landry, who is Abenaki, wants to establish a school farm to help indigenous youth by raising traditional crops. Of course, there is Vincent Lévesque and the Terre de l'aigle products, medicinal plants, essential oils, Labrador tea, and so on.

[Vincent Lévesque, Founder, Agricultural Society for Indigenous Food Products]

Kwe.

I will continue along the same lines as Mr. Gros Louis.

My name is Vincent Lévesque, and I am a member of the Huron-Wendat Nation. Basically, I am a communications man with a background in political science from Université Laval. I now work in agri-food, which proves that you never know where studies in political science will take you.

I know the economic development sector, and I believe in the potential of the First Nations. Because I believe in a vision of economic development and work, and to inspire pride in First Nations, I spent over 20 years creating networks and a business directory of indigenous communities in Quebec, the Prairies and Canada, a network I sold in 2008.

At the same time, I set up a company called Les produits autochtones Terre de l'aigle, which develops traditional incense and collaborates with traditional medicine men. We have developed expertise in the production of essential oils and plant maceration and have created medicinal synergies. I also work in partnership with a 74-year-old Innu medicine man, a third-generation healer, who teaches me a lot. In my company Terre de l'aigle, I have merged the modern with tradition, with a laboratory down below and a medicine man up top, who prescribes different plants.

Let me give you an example of medicinal synergy. I drink Labrador tea, something we have had much success with. It has about 70 uses and is world-renowned for treating hepatitis and cancer, as well as stimulating the immune system. I created a liquid concentrate that is even more powerful, and we made a powder version from it with the help of the Saint-Hyacinthe Research and Development Centre. Our company is apparently the first to use the Research Centre's pilot plants. I have been working on this project with the centre for the past seven years, and I would like to thank Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada very much for their help.

Mr. Gros Louis put me in touch with the necessary people because it is quite complicated for a small indigenous entrepreneur to advance projects within a large structure. I got help, and my project was approved. We have had great success in the laboratory. At the same time, my goal was to create a network of indigenous Labrador tea pickers across Canada, if necessary. We wanted to start with Quebec to make this plant better known. So I met with representatives of companies like Oasis to set targets for my liquid concentrate, which they liked. However, they asked me how much 8,000 litres of this concentrate would cost, and I couldn't answer them because I wasn't yet able to produce that much. I then began working with the pilot plant at the Saint-Hyacinthe Research and Development Centre, something I have been doing for the past seven years.

In addition, we founded the Agricultural Society for Indigenous Food Products, ASIFP, to establish a long-term vision for our future network and to include all the necessary people. It is a little complex in Quebec because of language issues and the fact that the communities are located more on forest land. They therefore do not practice the same type of agriculture as the Mohawks, who have more land to grow corn.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Mr. Lévesque, I have to stop you there, but you will have an opportunity to provide more explanations later.