Thank you. PACA continues to be within our top two issues: it bounces back and forth between one and two in our sector. It's a lost tool, especially when we're looking at how we expand and grow our trade. With our largest trading partner being the United States, the privileged access we had to this trading tool was a leg up on the rest of the world. Without it, we compete like everybody else, and it is a challenge. We know growers who are selling in the U.S. who are not getting 100% of the payment for what they're selling because they can't leverage the preferential access they had in the past with the PACA tool.
We are working with Innovation, Science and Economic Development, where we understand the file is currently being held. The minister of ISED, Minister Bains, has the power and authority to look at this and determine how we can best move forward. The proposal stays the same: a stand-alone piece of legislation to address the tool at no cost to Canadians, and a significant cost to ensuring that farmers get paid when they sell their product here in Canada in the event of a bankruptcy, and then being provided access to the tool in the U.S. when that bankruptcy protection is enabled here in Canada. That mechanism is still necessary to move forward. If we can create the bankruptcy tool here, we will regain access to the U.S.
Under NAFTA, we were anticipating that the U.S. would bring this forward, but there are so many shifts and movements around the NAFTA negotiations that we haven't heard anything yet. I would not hold the NAFTA negotiating process to be the sole solution to finding access to PACA. This is in our court, in Canada. We have to create the bankruptcy protection for farmers and fresh fruit and vegetable growers here, and provide them with tools so that in the event of a bankruptcy, they can access some form of protection.
Currently we are seeing a bit of misinformation flowing through ISED, and we're working at providing the correct information so the right decisions and the right information can be given to the minister.