As Ron just said, I'm the Chairman of the Canadian Centre for Food Integrity. I'm also an adviser to and supporter of many of the initiatives who have submitted or presented to you.
The centre has a mandate to be a service provider to Canada's food system and to help our food system earn public trust. We provide research studies on what the consumer is feeling or doing, or on what is happening. We provide dialogue experiences so that we can share with various industry players. We provide training and support. From farm groups to processors to companies to food retailers to food service to governments, that is the audience we are involved with.
We're only three years old but we've been involved in building public trust since 2006. Over the years we've learned a number of things about how to build public trust, but I'm not going to get into that today. Instead, I'm going to focus on two different areas. First off, what's making the Canadian system different and gaining traction, not only across Canada but across the world in a lot of ways? The second thing is the role that we believe the government must play and can play as our industry partner.
First, I'll go back to the Canadian approach. As the African proverb says, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far”—