Thank you, Ruth Ellen.
Thank you for your wonderful presentations.
Jason and I could probably have a conversation about which has richer farmland, my riding of Essex in southwestern Ontario or the Holland Marsh. We have the Hillman Marsh, actually, down in my riding.
With my being from a riding that represents agriculture very heavily, I know how important PACA is to the fruit and vegetable growers in my region. The lack of action by the Conservative government over the past two years has cost family farms tremendously. I might even go so far as to say we've lost family farms, which is something we simply can't afford anymore. We see many family farms disappearing from our landscape, unfortunately, and PACA is one reason that's been happening in southwestern Ontario.
I think we all can agree that sellers aren't protected, that this puts farmers at peril, that this is a threat to the family farm. I'm going to give you an example. In YorkâSimcoe, there was a farm that lost $38,302 on a load of produce to the U.S. because they didn't have the funds to post a double bond. I think a lot of people don't understand the double bond. I wonder if you can speak a bit about that, and the impacts on family farms when they have to consider being able to post a double bond, and if you think farms are losing out and potentially even being eradicated because of their inability to put up those funds.