Agriculture Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2017

[Cam Dahl, President, Cereals Canada]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Members of the committee, it's very good to be before you again. My name is Cam Dahl and I'm the president of Cereals Canada.

Just to briefly touch on who Cereals Canada is, we are a value chain organization. We bring together farmers, crop development and seed companies, exporters, and processors. The goal of this broad, diverse collaboration of partners is to enhance the domestic and international competitiveness of Canadian cereals industries. Cereals Canada is guided by a board of 18 directors that draws representation from each of these key stakeholder groups.

Just as a bit of an introduction, Cereals Canada supports the efforts of the Government of Canada to develop a comprehensive food policy. We agree that the four broad themes cover the key areas in which interdepartmental and cross-commodity policy would be helpful, specifically, increasing access to affordable food, improving health and food safety, conserving our soil and water, and growing more high-quality food.

Each of these four policy areas is individually large and complex. Developing overarching goals that reach consensus across different departments of the Government of Canada, provincial and territorial governments, non-governmental organizations, farm leaders, and companies is not a simple task, neither will be developing policies aimed at accomplishing these goals.

It is because of this complexity of issues that Cereals Canada makes our most important recommendation: do not rush this process and do not be driven by deadlines. We understand that there is a strong push from many quarters to have a national food policy in place quickly. We think that would be a mistake. A hastily constructed policy will undoubtedly miss key elements that are important both to Canadian society as a whole and to Canadian agricultural producers.

Taking the necessary time to get this policy right is more important than meeting specific deadlines. The first step in getting this process right is the development of strong and effective governance that will drive the process forward towards consensus. The development of effective governance is the focus of this submission from Cereals Canada. We believe an appropriate framework for the engagement on policy development is critical to achieving consensus on broad policy goals.

Targeted input on the four key policy themes is something we'll touch on later, but I would like to focus on governance.

Cereals Canada proposes the development of a national food policy council, the broad mandate of which would be to provide advice and guidance to the federal, provincial, and territorial governments as we move forward with the development of a national policy.

The council will also serve to bring together diverse stakeholders while creating linkages to the existing framework surrounding Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. Cereals Canada believes that the key elements for good governance for the national food policy include agriculture, civil society, and interdepartmental representation from the Government of Canada, provincial, and territorial governments, and that they will provide a pathway for issue- and commodity-specific research and policy development.

The need for broad representation from across Canada, from various sectors of the economy, and from federal, provincial, and territorial governments will result in a national food policy that is large. That is simply unavoidable. However, good governance indicates that the council should be limited if it is to be effective. Cereals Canada suggests that the overall size of the council be capped at 60 individuals in total. We propose 16 representatives to be drawn from agriculture and agri-food, 16 representatives to be drawn from civil society, and 24 representatives to be drawn from federal, provincial, and territorial departments, including the chair, which we suggest should be drawn from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

I would like to touch on agriculture and agri-food representation. Cereals Canada believes that the basic structure for consultations with and input from the Canadian agriculture and agri-food sectors is already in place through the value chain round tables. We therefore propose that the industry chairs of the following round tables comprise the industry representation for the national food policy council.

I want to read them out, because doing so will show the complete nature of this representation. We have a committee on food safety, the beef round table, the national environmental farm plan, the food processing round table, the grains round table, the horticulture round table, an organics round table, a pork round table, a poultry round table, a pulse round table, seafood, seed, sheep, special crops, the round table for sustainable beef, and the round table for sustainable crops.

There are key advantages to this structure. First, the round tables as a whole are representative of Canadian agriculture and agri-food. In addition, each of the round tables draws from a broad representation from the individual sectors that they represent. This includes, where appropriate, representation from non-governmental organizations and civil society, and in particular at the round table for sustainable beef and the round table for sustainable crops. Second, and this is important, linking to the round tables provides the national food policy council with the ability to delegate specific aspects of research and policy development to the appropriate industry and government representatives. This will allow the council to deal with the complexity of the issues that were outlined in my introduction.

To touch on civil society, I will not presume to name the individual groups or representatives from civil society that would be appropriate representatives for the national food policy council; however, we do strongly hold that the principles applied to the recommendations for agriculture be applied to the selection for civil society, namely, a broad representation of viewpoints. Representatives should have a national perspective, and representation should be selected to allow the national food policy council to delegate areas of specific research and policy development.

Finally, Cereals Canada supports Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's leadership of the development of the national food policy and leadership of the food policy council. This includes a recommendation that the food policy council be chaired by a senior representative of the department. As the lead department for the Government of Canada, AAFC would provide secretariat services to the council.

It is important to have a broad representation of the various government departments involved. I have listed them in the brief. I am not going to read them out, but they include Health research, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, of course, Indigenous and Northern Affairs, Social Development, and Trade. There is a significant list—

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Unfortunately, we are out of time. I thank you for your presentation.

Ms. Vanderkooy, you have seven minutes.

[Pat Vanderkooy, Manager, Public Affairs, Food and Nutrition, Dietitians of Canada]

Thank you.

I'm Pat Vanderkooy, and I'm here with Dietitians of Canada. We're the national professional association for our regulated health profession. We provide leadership in shaping food and nutrition policy.

We too congratulate the government on leading in the development of a food policy for Canada. We're very excited about that. To ensure the mandate and vision for a food policy, we offer today five recommendations. I'll probably spend the majority of my time on the first two.

Our first recommendation is that a food policy for Canada must include nutrition and health as key policy drivers to ensure a sustainable food system that promotes healthy diets.

Change is needed in our food consumption patterns to reduce the burden of diet-related disease. We need full policy integration with a common vision for population health and sustainability of the food system in its social, environmental, and economic aspects. High-calorie intakes and over-consumption of food and beverages that are high in sodium, sugars, saturated fat, and trans fat contribute to these diseases. These diseases have further complications that impact physical and mental health, decrease capacity for work, and increase premature death, so they have impacted our economy very directly.

We need more change in our food supply, specifically in the composition of the value-added portion of our food supply. Evidence from the past five decades shows how consumer eating habits have changed, with serious consequences to health and substantial costs to the health system and the environment. These are external costs. The food system players that we often mention in agriculture and agri-food are not paying directly for these costs. Consumers need healthy food environments where healthy choices are the default, where I can buy a can of tomatoes without salt as the default price instead of having to pay extra for the privilege of the salt withheld, so to speak.

What are these costs of diet-related diseases? In Canada we estimate that the five main diet-related diseases in Canada cost $26 billion annually in direct and indirect health expenses alone. PHAC has estimated that the total expenses, when they talk about the cost to the workforce and premature death, are around $68 billion. We're paying for that. All of us are paying for that. We're paying for it in money and we're paying for it in the costs to our society, really. As you know, once you get involved with the health care system, it's time-consuming. It's a lot of anguish. Our health system is overburdened. We're having to make more and more difficult choices.

The revenue that we put toward our publicly funded health care is in contrast to the revenue we get from food manufacturing firms, which provide an injection of $21 billion into the Canadian economy on an annual basis. I'm getting these cost estimates from the nutrition labelling cost analysis that was put forward when the nutrition facts table was updated. Compare $26 billion, or a total cost of $68 billion, with the $21 billion that is injected from the food industry. That's not really a sustainable business case.

I'm not suggesting that we could get rid of all diet-related disease, or that it's all due to what we have done within our agri-food industry. I am saying that there's an urgent need here to re-examine the priorities within our food system and to change the composition of our food supply—what we emphasize in growing, what we emphasize in producing, and how we produce it—to make the healthy choices the default choices. Today's agri-food industry must keep on reformulating, wherever and whenever possible.

I need to emphasize that this is work that is already being done and that needs to keep on being done. That's why we support Health Canada's mandated healthy eating strategy. It's a mandate just like the food policy is a mandate.

We're working toward healthier food products. That includes a shift to eliminating trans fat, monitoring sodium, initiating extra labelling in the form of front-of-pack labelling, and restricting child-directed marketing. Within “A Food Policy for Canada”, the new dietary guidance, with evidence-based guiding principles and environmental considerations, must inform the policy direction.

Our second recommendation is that a food policy for Canada must address the urgent challenges and unique food systems in northern and remote communities, and especially food insecurity amongst indigenous peoples.

Household food insecurity affects one in eight. I think one in eight is also what we say about the impact from food safety concerns. In fact, when you look at the prevalence in the population, one in four is the impact from just one diet-related disease—diabetes and prediabetes. When thinking about that one in eight being affected by some degree of household food insecurity, where we talk about food affordability, that first pillar, it's about the sufficiency of income.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

I'll have to ask you to conclude. We're just about out of time.

[Pat Vanderkooy]

The sufficiency of income means that food is affordable in some regions where people have good incomes, but it's not affordable where people have low incomes. There, we talk about income supports and local supports.

Nutrition north Canada subsidizes transportation only to selected communities for fresh foods in retail stores. It is not targeting food insecurity or the population that specifically suffers food insecurity, and it is not facilitating greater access to traditional and country foods.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Ms. Vanderkooy. We will have to end it there.

Mr. Bacon, you have seven minutes.

[Gordon Bacon, Chief Executive Officer, Pulse Canada]

Thank you.

I'm going to jump right into a discussion of one of the pillars, improving health and food safety.

Improving the health of Canadians should, in my mind, be the lead statement in a Canadian food policy. In the past, government has been particularly fixated on introducing regulations as the primary way to improve health. Regulations to reduce salt or sugar content in foods do not change the use of the salt shaker or the sugar bowl.

Government can play a bigger role in educating consumers about a dietary approach to food choices. Communicating the positive nutrition and health attributes of foods on food packaging is a way to educate consumers and incentivize the food industry to innovate and reformulate to feed the demand for healthier and more sustainable products. A greater presence of credible information sources, such as government-issued dietary guidelines, will be critical in establishing the benchmark that ensures consumers are educated about healthy diets. The food policy presents an opportunity to take action against obesity and diet-related diseases among Canadians, and judge the success by measurable reductions in diet-related disease.

Food safety is important enough to be included both in the pillar of improving health and food safety and in the pillar of access to affordable food. Access to safe food and water is a fundamental human right. What has to be clear in any discussion of food safety is what the exact problem is that needs to be addressed. Canada already has very good food safety rules in place. More rules and higher standards are not a substitute for ensuring that the current rules are being addressed. We all need to question whether more rules will make food safer. Perhaps the focus ought to be on consumer education for safety at home, and working with the food industry to ensure that the current rules are being followed along the entire value chain.

In the pillar of increasing access to affordable food, I would like to differentiate between food and diets. Individual foods can help meet nutrition needs, but overall dietary patterns have the greatest impact on long-term indicators of health. The objectives of a food policy can have a bigger impact if the focus is on ensuring access to an affordable balanced diet, rather than access to individual foods.

The next pillar is conserving our soil, water, and air. Let me spend some time on what is emerging as the biggest shift in global food innovation and the area that needs the most policy attention to ensure that we get it right in Canada and around the world. All of us recognize that the global production of food has a big impact on the planet. I'll save you the statistics. I am supportive of the need to be focusing on food as part of our environmental sustainability plan.

The policy discussion that is needed is about food consumption and ensuring that consumers understand the implications of their decisions. Dr. Jason Clay, of the World Wildlife Fund, raised a very interesting question at the recent Canadian Centre for Food Integrity meeting when he asked, “Should people have a choice about sustainable products, or should all choices be sustainable?”

In my view, we are overly fixated on farming and commodities, when we should be measuring the ecological impact of diets. It will not be enough to simply make incremental improvements to what we already do at the farm level. Thinking inside the box, or whatever the food is packaged in, will give us the opportunity to look at diet, formulations, and innovations in processing and food storage that can reduce water use, food loss, and a range of environmental impacts. You miss all of this when you focus solely on sustainability at the farm level.

The food policy for Canada has to focus on food and the choices that are made by consumers. At a minimum, the focus on sustainability within the food policy has to ensure that it gives consumers the sustainability information they need to make informed choices about which food item they take off the grocery store shelf and take home. Focus first on what goes into the grocery cart, not what goes into the grain cart.

We need dietary metrics for human health and ecological sustainability. The Swedish food policy, which I have a copy of here, opens with this statement:

When it comes to food, it's easy to concentrate on individual nutrients or foods to the exclusion of everything else. But all aspects are interlinked, so it's important to maintain a holistic approach.

This statement emphasizes that a new approach is needed, and many nations have already made the shift. We have to make sure that Canada takes a holistic approach, and not a simple rehash of the easy, old approach.

I can't leave sustainability without mentioning the role that Canadian agriculture plays in feeding the world. The food policy for Canada must recognize that we are an exporting nation and our decisions will have global reach, impacting consumers outside of Canada.

The current approach to environmental policy and food fails to address critical success factors, such as consumer education, a direct link between the policy and a measurable outcome of reduction in greenhouse gas, the need for affordable food, and how it positions Canada for attracting investment necessary for economic growth in food production and processing. This is clearly a scorecard that says we don't yet have the right approach to food and the environment.

Canada's food policy must align with the goals of economic growth and job creation. Government can foster competitiveness and innovation by providing incentives to place food that meets the health and sustainability goals in front of consumers. Think first of how tax policies and regulations can provide positive motivation for change. Governments, too, can think more about carrots and less use of the stick.

As a relatively small market, Canadian businesses must look beyond our borders for areas of growth. The Canadian government should, therefore, understand how its policies and regulations align with those of our trading partners, such as the U.S. and Europe. Between nations, our goals in health and sustainability are not dissimilar. One can then ask why our approach to tackling these challenges should be different.

There are 36.7 million Canadians, and every one of us has an opinion on food. The success of our food policy will be tested every time one of us goes to the grocery store to shop or looks at a restaurant menu. Clearly, education is needed to reshape a consumer's approach to food. The needed change in consumer behaviour should form the basis of how government chooses to regulate what a company can do and what it can say to keep food safe and ensure that consumers are informed of a bright future. Finally, a Canadian food policy must create economic opportunities and, at the same time, provide a healthy diet to Canadians that's within reach of the food insecure in Canada.

Therefore, the three elements of food policy success will include education, progressive regulation, and action to foster innovation.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Bacon.

We'll start our questioning round with Mr. Barlow for six minutes.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses for some great information. It's been enlightening. I'm going to drink water, not tea, for the rest of the day, since you talked about some of the numbers on diet-related diseases. I know that's something we have to address in terms of dealing with the root cause, and not the consequences, of some of these problems. I appreciate what you're saying.

One of the concerns I have about food policy is that I believe it's going to be the basis of a new Canada food guide. I think Mr. Bacon showed the Swedish food guide. What concerns me is that it seems that we're picking winners and losers in the agriculture sector. We are going away from animal proteins, such as chicken and beef. We're encouraging Canadians to have only vegetable-based proteins. For us, as a government, and as the ag committee specifically, I don't believe it is our job to be picking winners and losers in the agriculture sector. I think those are all healthy choices.

I would like your opinion. Is this something you've spoken with your members about? What would be your view on what I would consider drastic changes to our Canada food guide in terms of selecting winners and losers in the agriculture sector?

Mr. Dahl, go ahead.

[Cam Dahl]

This isn't something Cereals Canada has taken on, but I know it's something that some of my members have significant concerns about. Again, it gets back to ensuring that we're basing our decisions, especially by our regulatory agencies, on science and not what's on the Internet.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Ms. Vanderkooy.

[Pat Vanderkooy]

I would say that the message we've been hearing from Health Canada in the food guide is very much like what the food guide has been saying in the past, so I'm a little bit puzzled by some of the reactions we've heard. I'm not sure that the food guide, and the emphasis on plant-based sources of protein along with animal-based sources of protein, is different from what the message has been in the past.

If you look at the quantities that were suggested for serving sizes, they were small in comparison to what many people in Canada consider to be a regular serving size. In actual fact, I think it's just that you're hearing the message differently now. The emphasis on a balance between animal and plant-based protein sources is not different from what we've seen in the past in the food guide. To me, it's not a crisis, and it's not lacking in evidence because the evidence is there.

Health Canada undertook a comprehensive evidence review. If we have really large amounts of red meat and processed meats in our diets, we know that there's a higher incidence of cancer. That is why they made that particular comment about reducing the amount of red meat in high amounts, but other than that, they just talked about plant-based in general from an environmental sustainability point of view and good health in general.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Gordon, do you have anything?

[Gordon Bacon]

Yes. I don't like to characterize it as animal protein versus plant protein. I think it's a continuum. I think that what we need to look at is the opportunity to address the outcomes that we are looking for—human health, environmental sustainability, affordability of food items—and the pathway we can use to get there.

I think that the current food guide is out of date in a lot of ways. That really needs to be changed. The opening statement in the food guide here is the old approach: to look at individual nutrients or specific foods.

Here's one quick example of change, and it's an example for Cam of the cereals and pulses working together. You can go to a grocery store shelf and find loaves of bread that have differences of three times the fibre and twice the protein of option A versus option B. How do you make a recommendation for how much bread a person should consume when you have this tremendous variability across products?

I think if we're going to foster food innovation, diversification, and affordability, then we need to take a look at the outcomes. This is why I said the approach needs to shift to a dietary approach and not to an individual nutrient or specific food recommendation. I think the evidence shows that we need to look at dietary approaches and provide guidance to consumers on that basis, and I'm sure dieticians would agree.

[Pat Vanderkooy]

That's what guiding principle one in Health Canada's newly released document is about.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Yes, and I appreciate that. I hope Health Canada takes your input to heart because—and I think most of us have seen the first draft for the Canada food guide—explicitly, it doesn't talk about balance. It talks about eating a lot less animal protein and it encourages us to eat vegetables. Anyway—

[Pat Vanderkooy]

That's not how I read it. The guiding principle talked about a balance of foods and it named all of those in there.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Well, that's not how I read it. I appreciate that.

[Pat Vanderkooy]

Okay. Dieticians wouldn't teach it as “vegan is the way to go”.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Sure. I appreciate that.

[Pat Vanderkooy]

Vegan is one way, but it's not the only way.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

My last question is for Mr. Dahl and Mr. Bacon.

I met with some of your stakeholders and members in Winnipeg a month ago or so. One of the things that they brought up quite adamantly—and it's a big part of this—is access to affordable food. How do we maintain being able to provide affordable food for Canadians if there are these small business tax changes that might be implemented by the Liberal government, the carbon tax, and the elimination of deferred cash grain tickets? All of these things are going to make life much more expensive for our producers in the field.

Are there any comments from your members on that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

On that note, I have to end it there. Perhaps they will have a chance with the other questions.

Thank you, Mr. Barlow.

Madame Nassif, you have six minutes.

[Eva Nassif, Liberal, Vimy, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank our three guests for their presentations.

My question will be for Ms. Vanderkooy.

Some people say that there should be intergovernmental cooperation, cooperation with industry leaders, as well as a governance mechanism. Some say that this mechanism could take the form of a council, but it could be something else.

The question is ultimately linked to authority and governance. In your opinion, what concrete power should this governance mechanism have? What would the mission be?

[Pat Vanderkooy]

My third point that I didn't have an opportunity to speak to was about a governance mechanism. An intersectoral group of us just submitted—and I participated in that—a white paper on governance. We did talk about, in fact, what Cam spoke to, which was a national food policy council. I think my only point to add to Cam's description of a national food policy council would be that there be representation to speak to the pillars equally. In civil society, there are a lot of organizations that speak to health and environmental sustainability.

That would be my only comment, that the food policy council represent the diverse views, including the views of the different pillars in the food policy, so that there would be the affordability—therefore, poverty reduction and addressing food insecurity—health, the environment, and the economic implications for the agriculture business.