Agriculture Committee on April 30th, 2018

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

Mr. Chair, I can't recall if it was Mr. Petelle or Ms. Thomas who talked about the improvements to human health and the environment that research and innovation can impact.

Can you elaborate a little bit on both of those issues?

[Pierre Petelle]

I can certainly touch on some of them.

Drought-tolerant crops are already being produced, so in areas where water scarcity is an issue, it has a huge environmental impact. The biotech crops we do have—the herbicide-tolerant—have allowed for no-till farming, or conservation tillage, to Mr. Breton's point about greenhouse gas conservation and the fact that we're not driving over the land as many times as we used to in order to control weeds. There are a lot of factors that can be developed right in the genetics of the plant that have tremendous benefits for the environment or health, such as the oils that were mentioned.

[Krista Thomas]

It's a speculative example, but researchers talk about the potential of gene editing to remove allergens from crop species or to create plants that—again, this is a very speculative example—are better at the uptake of carbon. There are opportunities there to better respond to climate change.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you.

Now it's Mr. Barlow for six minutes.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Thank you to the witnesses again for your information.

It was certainly interesting that in many of your answers a couple of the things that came up over and over again were predictability and timeliness.

I think, Mr. Petelle, you said that those are two of the key issues we're trying to address here. Certainly, those are a couple of the things that many of the witnesses we've had here at this committee table for various studies—whether on climate change or water and soil conservation—have brought up time and again. We met with the University of Saskatchewan crop development centre. It's the same thing. They are developing new seed varieties and crop varieties. They can't get them to market because of the process.

I know this may be a hard question to answer, but I think the job of all of us here is to come up with a list of recommendations we can provide to the government to ensure that our stakeholders can be successful and can access these export markets. As you continue to talk about predictability, Mr. Petelle and Ms. Thomas, can you give me an idea of what predictability would look like? What would be your dream scenario? As part of this study, when we put together a list of recommendations, what can we do to address that question of timeliness and predictability? What would you like to see there?

[Pierre Petelle]

We have appeared before this committee before on the question of the re-evaluations with PMRA, and this committee wrote a very helpful letter to the then minister of health, highlighting some of the predictability concerns we had with the process of re-evaluation of PMRA. That language was very helpful. It hasn't changed the situation as of yet, but we're hopeful we're on the right path for that. There are some very specific process issues, for lack of a better term, with the regulators that we could use some support on.

On the plant breeding innovations, I talked earlier about a tiered approach to assessment. We've made very concrete, very specific, and, we feel, well-thought-out proposals. We need a receptive ear. That would be a tremendous help to pave the way for the regulators to consider some of these ideas.

[Krista Thomas]

Just to add very briefly to that, we're looking for a specific commitment to actually undertake a meaningful look at our regulatory programs for the pre-market assessment of novel foods, plants with novel traits, and novel feeds, with a commitment to act on the findings of that exercise.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

If I could just ask one last question, I'm going to give the rest of my time to Mr. Dreeshen, so could you answer quickly?

The other thing we heard many times, including from Mr. Kruszel from the Soil Conservation Council of Canada, is that there's a growing gap between having innovation and new technology and getting it to the producer. There's a big gap. They do these things, and then it sits on the shelf and never gets from one place to the next.

For example, I know we have some canola breeds that we've approved here in Canada, but we're not going to see them approved in China until 2019 or 2020.

What can the government do to try to address some of that issue, the gap, or that void as well?

[Pierre Petelle]

You'll probably get some specific numbers around what those delays in Chinese approval have meant for Canadian agriculture from some of the other witnesses. It's in the hundreds of millions of dollars at stake here.

Certainly, China is not a simple market to solve, just like that, so I'm not going to pretend that there's a simple answer there, but certainly there's continued engagement and continued dialogue with their counterparts over there. I think Minister MacAulay is headed to China again later this month.

We feel that these issues can and should be top of mind for those meetings, and we think it's going to take an ongoing dialogue and trust building up. I think opening the conversation toward an eventual free trade agreement might unblock some of those specific issues that we've had with China.

[Krista Thomas]

With respect to seed innovation and gene editing, we'd like to see Canada be one of the leaders of the global discussion, advocating for aligned regulatory requirements as this new technology evolves.

We're at a stage where we're at risk of each country putting in place a slightly different system, which would create an incredibly unpredictable environment for trade.

Partly why I've spoken so much about the domestic framework is that it's challenging for Canada to advocate for international clarity and predictability when we don't have it here ourselves.

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Thank you very much.

Just in the short time that I have, you had mentioned groups that plan on moving agriculture backward. It's very real. We've seen it with the neonicotinoid issue and with GMOs. We've seen the fight over the way the Europeans deal with their GMO issues, and the way that's processed.

We've also seen it in our oil and gas industry. That's what happens when you have activists who get ahead of industry.

Could you just zero in on a few of these and how, perhaps, government can stand up to these groups that are out there trying to demonize our natural resource industries?

[Pierre Petelle]

I think, all throughout some of the controversial items you mentioned there, we have a role to play, obviously, as the developers of those technologies, to explain the science and defend them. We take that role very seriously, but when we're pointing to a regulatory system that is robust and science-based and renowned around the world, we need that mandate for those regulators to have a role to play there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you.

Mr. Poissant, you have six minutes.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Good afternoon, Mr. Petelle and Ms. Thomas. Thank you for your presentations.

Mr. Petelle, you told us at the outset that 50% more food should be produced without technology, but that feeding a family could still cost up to $4,400. What did you base your comparison on to get those figures? Did you compare with organic agriculture?

[Pierre Petelle]

We produced a report we published two years ago where we made a comparison with organic agriculture in terms of difference in price and productivity.

We can provide the full study if you're interested.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

Okay.

Consumers are often very critical of GMOs, changes, fertilizers and herbicides. We know that you have sites to explain all that. However, do you have any other ways you use to earn public trust?

I live in Quebec and I know that open houses are held to explain to consumers how food is produced. However, we are still seeing a reluctance among those consumers.

How are you maintaining trust with the public?

[Pierre Petelle]

That's a very good question.

We have a campaign to educate and inform the public about the safety of the technologies that our members produce. We've been working closely with different audiences, the audiences that we consider more influencers rather than consumers directly. Dietitians, agriculture in the classroom, these types of forums allow us to answer questions, and provide information to people who are then asked lots of questions about food and food safety. That's been very useful.

That audience has questions about the technology. They don't necessarily have an angst or a fear coming into it, they just don't know. Once they've asked the questions, we provide information, supplemented by good information and defence from the regulators. It makes for a very compelling case.

In all of our polling that we've done, 5% to 10% of the very vocal detractor community will never change their position, and they probably often write letters to many of you about their views on agriculture. There is also a consistent 30% to 40% in all of our polling who don't have a strong view either way on pesticides, plant breeding, or plant biotechnology. That 30% to 40% of people are the ones who just don't have the information. They're very open to the information. When provided with a few key pieces of information, they quickly move to the “somewhat support” side of the equation.

We have a role to play. We take it seriously, but we feel that government, with its regulators, could also help with that 30% to 40% to inform them. It's not about swaying positions; it's about providing the facts, and letting them make their own decisions.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

We conducted a study to establish a food policy. Something that came up often in our study is food waste, which is estimated at 30%.

Ms. Thomas, could you tell me a bit more about that? If that waste was reduced by only 20%, what could that represent in terms of production?

[Pierre Petelle]

Food waste fits very nicely into this discussion about the innovations that the plant science industry produces, because oftentimes that food waste is due to fungal growth. Whether your tomatoes turn mushy and black, or the wheat that's grown has too much fungus in it for human consumption, there's a lot of waste associated with the presence of pests and pathogens. Having the tools available to be able to control those pests and pathogens at the right time is absolutely critical for agriculture. I can't stress that enough.

Even on the plant breeding side, there are varieties that are much more resistant to certain strains of fungal attack. With gene editing techniques, these things can happen much more quickly, so we can end up with many crops that have a much better profile to resist some of these pathogens that result in a lot of the food waste we see today.

[Jean-Claude Poissant, Liberal, La Prairie, QC]

The soybean aphid is more or less controlled by the Asian ladybug beetle. Are you monitoring the situation to determine whether the beetle is really effective or whether it is leading to another problem, so that two insects will have to be controlled?

[Pierre Petelle]

This is a very good example of where seed treatments have been extremely useful. Mr. Dreeshen talked about neonicotinoids. This is the issue around pollinators, and has been very controversial. Many people are coming out against neonics. In fact, Europe just announced a full ban on neonics.

The reality is that example you gave. You treat that seed, then it's put in the ground. You're not spraying over top of the crop. Your natural predators like ladybugs and many others are protected, and are able to get up to levels that help control those aphids. Not only is the seed treatment protecting that young plant from aphids and other insect pests, but as the plant grows bigger, the natural predators are able to thrive in that crop, because they haven't been sprayed over with an insecticide.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you. We're basically out of time.

I want to thank both of you. It was a very informative discussion and it will certainly contribute to our report.

I'd ask that everybody take a couple of minutes while we change witnesses, and then we'll be back.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Welcome to our second hour of discussion of technology in Canada's agricultural and agrifood sector.

In the second hour we have, from Bayer CropScience Inc., Mr. Paul Thiel, vice-president of product development and regulatory science; and from BioFoodTech, Mr. Jim Smith, executive director. Welcome.

We will give you up to seven minutes to make an opening statement if you wish.

Dr. Smith.

[Dr. Jim Smith, Executive Director, BioFoodTech]

First of all, I'll apologize for my lack of French.

I'm the executive director of BioFoodTech in Prince Edward Island. I'll talk about that first of all, and then I'll talk about FOODTECH Canada, which is a network of food technology centres.

First of all, BioFoodTech is an organization that provides technical support for the food and bioscience industry in Prince Edward Island regionally and nationally, and it does some international work as well. We're owned by the Province of Prince Edward Island, but we're funded only about 40% by the province, so we do cost recovery work on top of that to balance our budget. The type of work that we do, similar to other food technology centres around the country, is technical support for the food industry. We are scientists, technologists, and engineers working on behalf of industry and with industry on industry-funded projects.

This is in common with many other organizations around the country. I'll take a national perspective and really talk about all of the centres collectively, rather than just BioFoodTech, to help you understand what we have in Canada to support the industry for value-added food product development and technical support.

As you can see, there is a whole range of centres here. Most provinces have at least one centre, some have two centres. The only exception, New Brunswick, does not have a food centre. It has RPC, which is more engineering. British Columbia does not have a food technology centre, but it is in fact working on a new food technology centre at the moment—actually probably more than one.

We're very much similar to each other, but also very different. Many of them are owned by the provincial government, some are private, and some are institutes within universities.

The combined resources, then, of these centres—and this accounts for nine out of the 12 at the moment, as we're waiting for other information to come in—are 309 highly qualified scientists, technologists, and engineers; $220 million in building infrastructure; lots of processing and analytical equipment; and quite a large area of pilot plant. Each year, the centres collectively work with 870 companies, deliver $24 million in industry contracts, introduce 370 new products to market, and hold manufacturing technology workshops.

In terms of the types of services we provide, we're scientists, technologists, and engineers, so what we do is we work as the technical department for many food companies. Most food companies do not have technical people on staff. They don't have scientists or technologists on staff. This certainly accounts for most of the small and medium companies. The larger companies, of course, would, but the smaller ones don't. So we work as their technical department and help them to do product development, and solve problems and find equipment for them, that type of thing.

How do the food technology centres fit into the innovation ecosystem? We are the primary innovators. There was a study done a couple of years ago by KPMG on behalf of the Food Processing Industry Roundtable and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. What they found in their study was this is where the primary innovation is done: it's industry working with the food technology centres, because working together we can provide results and help to the industry in the short term. Our turnaround is two months to two years typically.

The scientific people we have working are “industrial-strength Ph.D.s”, basically Ph.D.s who are not interested in publishing, they're interested in working with the industry and helping to provide solutions to them.

The universities are a very important part of the innovation ecosystem, but their time frame is much longer. You're typically talking about five to 10 years before the results are commercialized. There's more of a priority towards publication, which the food technology centres typically do not do because their work is confidential.

What impedes innovation in Canada? Well, we basically don't have a strong culture of innovation within the value-added food processing industry, and 90% of the companies do not have a relationship with the food technology centres to help them to develop new products. One of the issues caused by that is that there's a huge trade deficit in value-added food products. According to CAPI, it's $8 billion. There are different measures of that, but it's a big number, and it's growing. Part of that is because of the lack of development and the lack of investment in innovation.

We are working every day to try to recruit new companies to come and work with us to develop their technologies, to do workshops and new product development. Our tag line at BioFoodTech is “concept to pilot to market”. What we like is to have companies come to us with ideas before they've developed them very far so that we can help them through the process of figuring out whether their ideas have any potential, and help them through the whole process.

I thank you. That's my opening statement.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you. That's right on time. That's great.

Mr. Thiel, you have seven minutes.