Agriculture Committee on Nov. 9th, 2017

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Fine.

Mr. Rosser, earlier you spoke about the food policy. You conducted consultations on climate change and the importance given to the environment in the food policy. How will the department develop a food policy that will take into account these comments that do not concern production and consumption? In your questionnaire, people were practically asked to answer that question from an environmental perspective. How can this be integrated into the policy?

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

I have to interrupt you here.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Already! I will get back to this later.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

We will probably have the opportunity to get back to it.

Mr. Longfield, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you both for coming here. I've seen you both in Guelph recently. It's great to get back together in Ottawa.

Mr. Gray, when we were at the soil conservation event this past July, we saw a lot of examples of soil management. One that sticks in my mind is the use of genetics to develop root structures that go deeper into the soil to return carbon deeper into the soil, and developing the genetics around root architecture so that our soil has a chance to get the carbon replaced. Could you comment on how the interaction between your department and the innovation and science department might work so that we can get solutions like this developed and then to market? How do you collaborate?

[Dr. Brian Gray]

I guess the department with the most overlap with our mandate would be Environment and Climate Change Canada. We already had a fair bit of collaboration happening at the bench scientist level. It was happening. Scientists do what scientists do. They go to conferences to present their papers, which is an early peek at something that will be formally published later. It's a chance for other scientists to kick the tires so to speak. At those conferences, they meet people with neat ideas they hadn't thought of, and they get together and then they talk about collaborating on new science. In that general process our scientists have come across Environment and Climate Change Canada's scientists, and they were collaborating.

Before I answer it completely, I don't want to leave the impression that nothing was happening, but given this government's mandate, given our minister's mandate letter, we needed to formalize it. So at my level, with Environment and Climate Change Canada, we formalized an MOU, which we both signed, and we have a work plan. In that work plan, I'd say a third of it is something that staff were already doing, but we have new areas that we're going to grow into. This is using existing monies. This is not an opportunity to grab more money. It's just that in these areas where we're working, we can collaborate better. So we'll stay in our own funding envelopes, but we collaborate on the science.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Great. Then with this type of a collaboration with Environment and Climate Change Canada, looking at the clean fuel standard, the production of ethanol and putting ethanol into fuels, whether it's diesel or gasoline, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada is going to play a role in developing new fuels that are more environmentally friendly. When it comes to working on the clean fuel standard, is that something that you're currently working on with Environment and Climate Change Canada?

[Dr. Brian Gray]

That is not part of the MOU I just mentioned. There are areas that we're collaborating on that are led by Natural Resources Canada, which Tom can speak to.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Terrific. I was suspecting that one of the two of you might have a connection to that.

[Tom Rosser]

Mr. Chair, the member is quite right that work on the clean fuel standard is led by our colleagues at Environment and Climate Change Canada, but our department is actively collaborating and working with them on it.

Your question reminds me of something I perhaps should have mentioned at the outset, namely, that the bioeconomy is an important part of our efforts on climate change. Not only is it an important opportunity from an environmental standpoint, but also economically. The most recent data from Statistics Canada suggests that the non-traditional bioeconomy, both forestry and feedstock-based agriculture is a $4.3-million industry in Canada and employs thousands of people. Some of that will be biofuels, but of course there are bioproducts, there are car parts, any number of products, usually made from petrochemicals, that can now be made out of renewable feedstocks.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

I saw it on Twitter today. There's a little more research to be done, but there was an indication that Canada is now leading the G20 in clean technology.

Could you comment on the investments in clean technology? You talk about the projects that could come forward. I know we have one in Guelph, where an auto parts manufacturer is looking at creating renewable natural gas from plastic and then taking the carbon by-product and using that as carbon inputs to possibly fertilizer and other agricultural or industrial applications.

[Tom Rosser]

Certainly as a department, we have a history of supporting innovation in the bioeconomy space with respect to agriculture. I think I mentioned in my opening remarks that budget 2017 made an investment of $200 million to support exactly those kinds of opportunities, clean technology in the natural resources sector writ large, including agriculture.

We see that as an additional new source of support to help realize economic opportunities in the agricultural bioeconomy.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

There's also the Sustainable Development Technology Canada fund. As a member of Parliament, it's hard to direct people to the right places because there are so many. Is there a one-door approach that we're considering?

[Tom Rosser]

We as a department, in partnership with a number of other departments, led by colleagues at ISED and Natural Resources, have established a clean technology hub. The idea is to have a single point of contact, where project proponents can go to talk about the full suite of federal supports. That was just recently established in the past several months.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Terrific, Mr. Rosser.

Thank you, Mr. Longfield.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Ms. Trudel, you now have the floor. You have six minutes.

[Karine Trudel, NDP, Jonquière, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much for your detailed presentation. We appreciate it.

Earlier you mentioned experimental farms. I must point out that I'm very proud of the work done at the Normandin Research Farm, which is linked to the Quebec Research and Development Centre. I had the opportunity of visiting the farm this summer and of meeting the scientists, people who were full of ideas and passionate about their work. I want to take this opportunity to mention that I strongly encourage providing funding for their activities. I discovered the full importance of research when I visited them this summer.

The new Canadian Agricultural Partnership will soon be in effect, in April 2018. That budget was not increased. However, climate change is having an increasing impact on our environment and our farmers.

I have two questions to ask on this topic.

To what extent will the new Canadian Agricultural Partnership be able to provide the necessary support for Canadian producers?

Will there be new investments to help farmers face climate change and to allow them to adapt quickly?

[Tom Rosser]

I am going to try to answer your question. My colleague may want to add something.

Yes, that is one of the six priorities in the new Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change. We are already working hard on this, without waiting for April 1, 2018. We believe we can better target our resources in our negotiations with the provinces and territories, and that we can better use existing resources to advance environmental objectives.

As I mentioned in the beginning, in addition to our planned spending with the provinces and territories in the context of the framework, there are several complementary initiatives, such as investments in clean technology, for instance. We also believe that this can provide a significant source of funding to help us reach our environmental objectives.

[Karine Trudel, NDP, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Gray, do you have something to add?

You can answer me in English.

[Dr. Brian Gray]

I would simply like to thank you for your positive comments about the Normandin farm. I have not visited it yet, as I only took up this position two years ago. It is on my list.

[Karine Trudel, NDP, Jonquière, QC]

It's only a matter of time.

[Dr. Brian Gray]

That's all for me.

[Karine Trudel, NDP, Jonquière, QC]

We've talked a lot about producers. In the area I am from, the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region in Quebec, there are more than 350 farms. A lot of livelihoods depend on farming, and there are both dairy farms and vegetable farms. In my opinion, the farmers do a remarkable job. When we talk about climate change, we have to remember that they too are a part of the solution. They make a lot of efforts to improve their environment, and they have a lot to teach us, in fact.

This summer, when I visited vegetable producers, I had the opportunity to speak with organic farmers about the problems caused by insects. You spoke about this in your presentation earlier, in fact. Global warming is causing a proliferation of insect pests, on organic and other farms, and they are a serious issue.

Has the department taken global warming and its impacts into account in the implementation of the next framework? If so, what are your strategies to mitigate the risks involved?

[Dr. Brian Gray]

The minister will announce the details of the new Canadian agricultural partnership at the appropriate time. Once he announces more details, we'd be happy to come back to discuss this.

[Tom Rosser]

I'd like to add that through our risk management program, there are tools in place that can help farmers manage the risks involved when extreme weather events occur. We already have a framework in place to help producers manage those risks.

Last July, the department decided to renew those programs, and to also review their functioning, in order to determine if changes were needed. We have begun this work and will submit a report to the minister next summer. One of the questions we will examine is the evolution of the risks producers face. We have to determine whether current programs are sufficient to help them manage those risks, or whether we need to make changes to them.