Agriculture Committee on March 21st, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Mr. Peschisolido, the floor is yours.

[Joe Peschisolido, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Gentlemen, lady, thank you for appearing, most of you, again, in front of the committee.

I'd like to follow up on Mr. Breton's question and make it more specific to British Columbia and metro Vancouver.

There are a variety of very good programs, the trinity of agri programs you talked about for innovation, marketing, and competition. There's also the shared program with the province of B.C. As you know, in British Columbia the big movement about 10 or 15 years ago, which I think is now expanding, was based on a regional food security agenda. It started out as a small-scale farmer's market but is now very lucrative and includes the whole of the Pacific northwest. We've reached a point of critical mass where we can start exporting beyond simply California, Washington, and Oregon.

How specifically can we work within these clusters that you have? I asked the minister about a program at Kwantlen. If I wanted to create a research centre dealing with mixed farming that would look at how we can expand and make more commercially viable our security policy for British Columbia and that whole area, how would I go about doing that? Maybe I'm also following up on Mr. Longfield's question.

How would I go about doing that?

[Gilles Saindon]

Thank you for the question.

There are probably different ways of going after this, but it's also dealing with the United States and, in this case, those might be some approaches that would have some merit there.

We do talk every year to the United States and the USDA ARS, the research arm of the USDA, and we identify areas of priority. That maybe would be a place where I would go first to see if there is anything we can do together bilaterally with them, because for everything in the Pacific northwest they have a significant presence and footprint there. We meet them quite routinely. That might be one place where we would go, but the—

[Joe Peschisolido, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

My apologies for interrupting, but I'm going to do it anyway. What if I wanted to help create, with the folks in B.C. or in my area, a research centre to study what I just talked about? How would I go about that? Who would I talk to? We'll leave the Americans out of it for now. How can I work with the existing structures and all these wonderful programs to create a research centre at Kwantlen, working with UBC or other institutions of education in B.C.?

[Gilles Saindon]

What I would like to add to this is that perhaps within the province of British Columbia, I would refer to it as a virtual research centre, because we have structures federally and also provincially. The universities and also the ministries of agriculture and forestry have some facilities. We also have the Canadian Food Inspection Agency on the ground there. That might be a way to mobilize industry.

We could work with the existing programs we have, such as agri-innovation and clusters and projects, which could be led by particular areas, and we would just mobilize these people and work in partnership, but it would be a virtual arrangement. That's basically what agri-innovation programming is all about. It allows us to mobilize the people across various jurisdictions—federal, provincial, universities, and industry—and we can work together on these projects.

[Joe Peschisolido, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

I see. So there isn't a program where...? I have scientists, professors, and young farmers who want to get into the industry. There isn't a program where we can get some funds and actually start a research centre at Kwantlen or tie it up with Simon Fraser and UBC to look at this stuff?

[Gilles Saindon]

We would have to look into the eligibility of these programs, yes.

[Joe Peschisolido, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

That's excellent.

There's one other question I wanted to ask, if I have a moment. There are also farmers in my area that are bypassing the process. They do direct marketing, and it's very lucrative, whether it's in potatoes, chickens, or whatever. They're doing this on their own. Do they have a niche market because there's a safety issue and maybe animal welfare issues...? People want to buy the products.

They are in my riding and they're all over, I would say. They're in metro Vancouver and in Chilliwack and across the whole area there. Are there any programs we can use to help these individual farmers who are doing direct marketing and maybe tie that into how the department functions in its view of agriculture?

[Tina Namiesniowski]

Mr. Chairman, maybe I can attempt to answer that question.

Under our market development stream of programming that's offered at the federal level, we have what we refer to as generic market development, as well as the market development support that we provide small and medium-sized enterprises. Generic market development is targeted at associations that represent either a commodity or a part of the sector.

The small and medium-sized component of our agri-marketing program allows us to deal specifically with a smaller organization that is working on their own behalf to market their products abroad. There are some eligibility requirements around that. Typically, it's an organization that has fewer than 250 employees and annual sales that don't exceed $50 million. Through that stream, we're able to provide in-year funding to small and medium-sized enterprises to enable them to market their product abroad.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Ms. Namiesniowski and Mr. Peschisolido.

Mr. Gourde, or rather Mr. Arnold, will now have five minutes.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I have one question, and then I may pass my time on to Mr. Aboultaif.

I've looked at the estimate sheets, and everything seems to be fairly consistent there, but what I usually do with these sheets is look for anomalies. One that I spotted is in the community pastures program, with a significant cut in the FTE positions from 133 down to 90. That's 43 positions. Perhaps you can explain that large cut.

[Pierre Corriveau]

From an FTE point of view, as you know, the government announced in budget 2012 the gradual transfer of the community pasture programs to the various provinces—Manitoba and Saskatchewan in particular—so this reflects the gradual reduction over five years, and we're now in year three.

My colleague here, Tina, who was managing this program can provide you with more details.

[Tina Namiesniowski]

We now find ourselves in year three of a five-year divestiture process, so at this point in time the Government of Canada has ceased operating federal community pastures in the province of Manitoba. We're still engaged in the province of Saskatchewan, although in keeping with the divestiture schedule, by the end of March 2018, we will have ceased the operation of federal pastures in the province of Saskatchewan as well.

We have staff who will continue to work in the pasture operation until that period of time. We continue to run those pastures on the land that has yet to be divested back to the province, and we'll continue to do so until we cease the operation of the federal program.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

On fostering business development, it's also under the sector capacity main title, but again I see a loss from 13 down to 6 in FTEs; that's cut by more than half.

Is that part of a transfer to the Growing Forward 2 program, or can you explain that fairly significant cut? It's in table 3 of the document we were provided.

[Pierre Corriveau]

Maybe we'll get back to the chair. We can look for the answer. Maybe my colleague can talk about the program per se.

[Tina Namiesniowski]

Mr. Chair, under our agri-competitiveness program, we have a stream that is referred to as fostering business development, and that is a stream that provides $15.6 million in contribution funding over five years to not-for-profit organizations that operate nationally and have experience in delivering services and products for farmers and producers.

For example, that would include 4-H as one of those organizations we support under that program.

Those are agreements that we entered into at the start of the agricultural policy framework, and they will continue until the end of the framework . Those agreements with those organizations last for five years.

[Pierre Corriveau]

I think we'll have to get back to you with more detail. At the time of the production of the RPP that program hadn't been renewed per se, so I think that's the adjustment from the FTE perspective. We'll get back to you on this.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I appreciate the answer on that.

If I have any time left, I'll pass it on to my colleague.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Go ahead.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

I have a quick question. Since the 2013-14 fiscal year, spending on internal services has increased for the CGC, the Canadian Grain Commission. Internal services include activities that support and enable delivery of the CGC's strategic outcome and programs to the CGC stakeholders. Can you explain why spending has increased?

[Pierre Corriveau]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's a good question.

There's no official from the CGC, but we work collaboratively between the two organizations.

In the past the department used to provide a human resources service to the Canadian Grain Commission, but they're really like a separate entity from the department, so this reflects the Canadian Grain Commission's taking on the responsibility for delivering their human resources to their own organization.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Ms. Brosseau, you have the floor for three minutes.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you. I did not expect to be asking more questions.

Members from both sides of the table have asked questions on milk proteins.

Do you think that the Canadian Dairy Commission has the resources it needs to enforce standards, or not? Is that a question you can answer or not?

[Frédéric Seppey]

Thank you for the question.

As the minister said, the cheese composition standards are the responsibility of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. The agency is in charge of allocating the required resources to ensure compliance with the rules.

There is talk of arrangements that could be made between the CFIA and the CDC, as has been done in the case of certain issues, but the responsibility for regulating can still not be delegated. It really comes under the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

[Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

However, could the Canadian Dairy Commission carry out the audit? That recommendation has been issued by the Dairy Farmers of Canada, as well as by other witnesses who have appeared before our committee. They talked to the committee about how changes could be made to stop the importing of dairy proteins.

Can you tell us more about that?