Agriculture Committee on Feb. 5th, 2019

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Okay, sorry.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Before I go on, I want to welcome Mr. Eyolfson and Mr. Yurdiga, in replacement, to our committee.

Mr. Longfield, you have six minutes.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you.

Thanks to Guelph for being here.

Earl Dreeshen was leading down a path there, in terms of investment in indigenous farming, the equipment that's needed, and whether indigenous farmers have access to the same types of financial support. Is that where you were going with that question?

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Somewhat, yes.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Maybe you could comment on that, because there are different types of agriculture.

Then I want to get to Manitoba after this.

[Sheri Longboat]

I can answer from some of the experiences I've had in working with communities in terms of forwarding some of their agendas on food sovereignty and security. I've been up in northern Ontario, the Nishnawbe Aski Nation and territory, which represents about 45,000 people in 49 communities, northern and remote. In speaking with these communities and hearing their stories in terms of what they need to feel food-secure and then towards the path of sovereignty, for many of these communities it was just getting access to.... Some of the stories...for example, one elder said, “I just need some access to some soil to start some community gardens.”

We heard other stories from a gentleman who was diagnosed with severe diabetes. He began changing his food, how he ate. He began accessing local foods, traditional foods and, through that, even accessing the fish from his environment, which then brought up some issues for him such as the safety of the fish in terms of water quality. He began using that as a mechanism to bring some of the youth back out to the water and to the land, and he started to see these transformations happening in the community.

I use this as an illustration to say that, when we look at some of these solutions here, we'll be looking at multi-dimensional solutions and targeting different layers, and some of the layers are quite grassroots, some basic support. As Stephen said, there are many models across the country, and one of the recommendations we'd support is having an inventory saying what's happening out there, because a lot of communities are asking, “How do we re-engage? How do we do this? We heard neighbours down the road or up in the north are engaging in these ways”, and that was something they asked us to begin looking at as well. That would be one way.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you.

We didn't quite get to the investment piece, but maybe we can circle back to that.

I'm thinking of Manitoba—I'm originally from Winnipeg—and thinking of the different types of communities. The Métis nation used to have access to the bison and the herds were eliminated. Now bison is making somewhat of a return, and there are different types of practices around harvesting bison.

St. Laurent, up in the Interlake, has access to fish. We don't think of fish as agriculture because it's a different department in the federal government, so we get some cross-jurisdictional issues. I've been up at Fox Lake; I've been at the mine site, and there isn't a lot of farming up in Fox Lake. There isn't access to soil. Then in the Whiteshell, on the Manitoba-Ontario border, there's wild rice harvesting and wild rice processing.

The definition of agriculture in terms of first nations is as diverse as are the first nations and Métis. How do we deal with that as a federal government?

[Hannah Tait Neufeld]

Maybe I'll let Stephen speak to this as well. I lived in Manitoba for nine years. Stephen currently lives there.

I totally agree, and I see the same circumstances from the work that I do in Ontario. I think there are different needs in southern Ontario, other than the ones you've described, which are very astute. One is the ability to access land. Even though there is plenty of arable land available, it's very expensive.

In and around the GTA and London areas, many of the communities I worked with, such as the Chippewas of the Thames and the Oneida First Nation, have very strong agricultural traditions but not a lot of access to land, so there's that piece.

I think there are two major pieces: access and knowledge.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Great.

[Hannah Tait Neufeld]

As Sheri was mentioning, there are some great things occurring, very diverse and innovative things, but there isn't really a way of connecting those pieces and allowing communities to learn from each other. I think that's a big piece, too. Ideally, at the federal level, that's something that could be assisted with.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

When we're working on reports, we're looking for that type of suggestion of what we could suggest back in connecting the best practices through first nations associations and university associations.

[Hannah Tait Neufeld]

I'll just say one thing, and I'll let Stephen respond. I think the communities are quite diverse as well.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Right.

[Hannah Tait Neufeld]

I tried to lead to this. This is a picture at the University of Guelph. This is our organic farm and some of the indigenous gardens that we had growing there this summer. I think the first nations themselves, on reserve, are one piece, but there is also a lot of migration to and from the communities and a lot of really interested individuals who are living off reserve, and the Métis nation as well.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

I have less than a minute.

[Stephen Penner]

Very quickly, you asked how we can recognize different forms of indigenous agriculture. The Tsuut'ina Nation in Alberta recognizes it as honey. Up in Naujaat in northern Nunavut, they recognize it as caribou and char. We have to recognize it as a community. We think we have to recognize it as the community recognizes it, and then we can empower those communities to do the work that they see as necessary to establish both food sovereignty and an export market, but I think there are some things the Canadian government can do.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Food safety is a big piece of this. When you go north, there is mercury in the food. The food supply is tainted, so food safety has to be part of it.

[Stephen Penner]

Food safety is part of it. When we think about how our indigenous people have been here forever, they know what to eat and how to eat it, but they also know what's there in abundance, so they can develop an export market for it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Penner.

Thank you, Mr. Longfield.

Mr. MacGregor, you have six minutes.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you very much to all three of you for appearing before the committee today. I hail from Vancouver Island, so within my riding we have the Cowichan, Malahat, Lyackson, Halalt, Ditidaht and Pacheedaht. There are many different nations and many different cultures even within that small space.

You're so right, that when you're talking about indigenous.... The word “agriculture” means so many different things. It's such a diverse group when we talk about first nations. I'm thinking of the Cowichan, in particular. There's evidence that they used to manage the Cowichan River by building weirs to manage the fish stock. Salmon is a central tenet of their culture and their food, whether it's the coho, the chum, or the chinook. There is also evidence of carefully managed clam beds as well. They have a saying, “When the tide goes out, the table is set.” This subject has the potential to veer into other departments, like the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, when we're talking about managing a food resource.

I really appreciate your comments on indigenous food sovereignty and some of the recommendations you have for the development of a food policy for Canada. As was already mentioned by some of my colleagues, we don't have to rely just on your testimony today. You're very welcome to submit a brief with further details that explain some of the things you'd like to see, and we'd welcome seeing that.

I do have to apologize, though, because I have limited opportunities to speak at this committee, being the sole New Democrat.

Mr. Chair, at this moment I want to use my time to move a motion.

Committee members will have received my notice of motion. It was given last year, and it specifically pertained to undertaking a study on the commercialization of unpasteurized milk in Canada. I wanted the study to include witnesses regarding the current consumption of the milk, how other jurisdictions regulate the sale, and that we report our findings back to the House of Commons.

I can make some opening comments once that's been passed around.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Go ahead.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Colleagues, I have four main points to make on this.

First of all, we all know from our local communities that the consumption of raw milk in Canada is probably one of the largest unregulated markets. We all know people who consume it, and yes, Health Canada has its position on it, but it's not preventing people from consuming it. I think this is a real area of opportunity that we have as a committee to study this issue, but more importantly, to look to other jurisdictions. In Canada, agriculture is a shared jurisdiction between the federal government and the provincial governments. We do use our criminal law power and our regulation over interprovincial trade to regulate raw milk, but I think we can really benefit from looking at other jurisdictions.

If we look down to the United States, there are 37 states, comprising 76% of the population, that have legal off-farm sales, farm gate sales, or herd shares. Some of our largest trading partners in the European Union, including France, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Austria and the U.K., allow the sale of unpasteurized milk.

I know there are concerns out there about the health risks associated with it, but there is data from the United States showing that with the increased distribution there has actually been a decrease in the outbreaks. This is coming from the prevalence of on-farm food safety programs, which have had a significant role in decreasing the risk.

To summarize and to finish up, I believe that we, as a committee.... This being an agricultural product, and given the fact that our calendar in the weeks ahead has not been filled up by a study, I would like to move this motion that we start this study upon the conclusion of the current one.

I welcome committee members' comments on this.

With that, I move the motion, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.

Are there any comments or discussions on the motion?

Monsieur Poissant.

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

I'm not sure that would be a good idea. There have been cases of bovine tuberculosis detected in British Columbia, and milk may be contaminated. I'm not sure I want us to do a study on this to allow people to have access to raw milk. Public health has to be our top priority in any study.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Are there any other comments?