Agriculture Committee on May 15th, 2020

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

I understand.

You also talked about the proposed $77.5 million, saying that this amount has already been spent and that it covers virtually none of your needs. You mentioned that it was high time the government announced new investments. However, is it not getting too late for that? Are you afraid of business closures?

[Carla Ventin]

I think we're at a critical time right now.

First of all, we absolutely support funding primary producers and primary processors. Our member companies use the very ingredients in meat processing facilities and put them into packages for store shelves.

It is a critical time. What we are seeing now is an increasing focus on food security and self-reliance, and not just in this country. Other countries are doing the same thing. Policies are being introduced that are trying to repatriate manufacturing. We are very concerned about companies leaving this country and deciding to manufacture in other countries. Once these companies are gone, they're not coming back.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Thank you, Ms. Ventin.

My next question is for you, Mr. Blondin. It deals with the same subject, that is, the very marginal assistance currently provided by Canada to the agricultural and manufacturing sectors, among others, compared to what is being done elsewhere. Earlier, Ms. Kawaja talked about her pride in seeing that your company is the only one of its kind remaining in Canada and her fear that it will cease its activities or relocate them abroad. Can you tell me about the urgency of the need for action and the significant gap that exists between the assistance offered in neighbouring countries and that offered by Canada?

[Philippe Blondin]

I don't necessarily want to compare us to our neighbours. Instead, I'm going to talk about the help that is available in Canada right now.

We talked about the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, which covers 75% of a company's wages. In terms of our company, we have lost over 40% of our sales. On the other hand, we built a new plant. When you add up the numbers, it looks like our sales are increasing, but they are not. So we're losing that portion of our revenue.

In addition, we have already increased the wages of employees at our Ontario plant by $2 per hour. We have also added a retention bonus of $3 per hour that is paid at the end of the month if employees have worked the entire month. These bonuses are in excess of a 30% wage increase. So we think the criteria should be expanded a little bit. The government should understand that companies like ours are investing to create new jobs. As such, we should be able to benefit from the same assistance that the government offers to preserve current jobs.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Blondin and Mr. Perron.

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

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for appearing today.

Ms. Ventin, maybe I'll start with you, Food & Consumer Products of Canada. I'll continue along the line of questioning you've already received. You mentioned that the CERB ran the risk of disincentivizing workers. However, when I speak to workers, and not only in my riding but across Canada, they're getting mixed messages, especially the ones in the essential services industries. We have seen massive COVID-19 outbreaks in some food processing centres. They're getting messages from public health officials that physical distancing measures are very much in place. Some of them also may have family members at home with compromised immune systems or may be in regular contact with elderly relatives. The CERB is $2,000 a month. If you look at the average costs of a Canadian household, that doesn't really stretch all that far.

I appreciate the comments you've made. I'd like to hear your thoughts from the point of view of the workers and the awkward position they find themselves in. They feel a lot of pressure to return to work, but many, I think, still have very great fears. In some provinces there are still some very large outbreaks going on.

[Carla Ventin]

We're absolutely on the same page here. The number one priority is to keep Canadians safe, to keep workers safe. For our member companies, that's absolutely their priority. They want to keep their workers safe, and they want to keep their doors open. I think that's really important. Our members have incurred a lot of the costs of taking the health and safety measures that are necessary, and they are very carefully following the public health guidelines.

The way we look at it is that incentives are the way to go, so providing those top-ups, and not just for the health care workers but also for workers who make food. It's extremely important. Also if the private sector wants to provide those top-ups, it needs to be given some tax incentives to provide those top-ups. We're looking at encouraging those workers.

You know, it's interesting. The challenge of getting Canadians excited about agriculture and food is really difficult, and that was the case pre-COVID-19. It's very interesting because we see this issue only getting worse.

I do have a final point. We do appreciate Ag Canada, and some of the provinces have really stepped up and have public campaigns to say that this is an important industry and people should be proud of working in this industry and to encourage Canadians. We want to look at incentives to do so.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you for that.

I appreciate also, in your opening statement, that you mentioned the pressures that your member companies are under due to the increased costs for personal protective equipment, the training you now have to go through, the physical distancing, and so on. You did provide a brief overview of some measures that can be employed.

I'm just wondering. When I go to my local grocery store, I can now see that it has pretty permanent-looking Plexiglas up. Can you give me a sense of the gross costs that companies are starting to incur to install this equipment, any sense of that and what we're looking at in the months ahead? There is going to be a pretty hefty price tag to get our workplaces reoriented in this way.

[Carla Ventin]

Well, we do represent a diversity of small and large facilities and different types of processing, so it does really matter whether it's vegetable processing, or meat, or further packaged processing. We are seeing the Plexiglas and other barriers, or the staggering of shifts, or rather than just one shift having fewer people but running 24 hours a day. The cost really would depend, but we do know it is really significant. What we are hearing from our smaller companies is that it is definitely much more challenging for them to pivot and to absorb these costs, which presents cash-flow challenges.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you.

I want to go to your comments regarding the wage subsidy, just to make sure I heard right. I want to make sure you were echoing what I've heard in my own riding. A lot of the essential industries have not necessarily seen their gross revenues go down, because they're still operating, but their costs have absolutely shrunk their net income. Is that really very much in line with what your industry members are hearing and why they're still falling through the cracks of the Canada emergency wage subsidy?

[Carla Ventin]

Yes. We are absolutely seeing that very issue. It's not necessarily showing in the revenue, but the costs are enormous and rising. One of the big things—and I think it's across the sector and across Canada—is the uncertainty. It's very difficult in planning, and it's not just generally. It's securing those ingredients that you expect on time. It's maintaining your storage, maintaining transportation and getting access to PPE. That uncertainty is really also absorbing a lot of cost and making it a real challenge to operate.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you.

Maybe for my final question, I would say that I don't think it's too early for us to start looking into the future at how we're going to build some resiliency into this system. How are we going to design our food supply system from farm to fork when the next pandemic hits? Do you have any thoughts for a long-term vision of how we build that resilience into our system?

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Be very quick.

[Carla Ventin]

Sure.

I would just say three broad things. First, we need to keep our facilities open, and that includes targeted, strategic investments in a sector as important as food. Second—to your earlier point—we need to get the workers into the facilities and keep them safe. Finally, we need to get the product effectively and efficiently to the customer, whether that's the restaurant, the grocery store or the export market.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you very much, Ms. Ventin.

Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.

That is all the time we have.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Chair, I have a request.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

You have the floor, Mr. Perron.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Could we give Mr. Brubacher a few minutes to outline his testimony in one or two minutes? The sound might be better than it was before.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

The interpreters have already said that the sound was bad. I apologize to Mr. Brubacher, but you have to have a certain quality of sound to be able to hear the testimony.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Can the witness send us a summary of what he wanted to tell us? Then we could benefit from his testimony. I feel sorry for him. I think it's a shame he couldn't finish his testimony.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

That is a very good suggestion, Mr. Perron. I will ask Mr. Brubacher to send us a summary.

Again, Mr. Brubacher, we apologize for that. If you want to submit a brief, we will certainly take it into consideration in our whole study. Perhaps another time we can have you in as a witness again.

This completes our time for this panel.

I want to thank our witnesses today: Mr. Brubacher from Bio-En Power, Carla Ventin from Food & Consumer Products of Canada, and Elisabeth Kawaja and Philippe Blondin from Whyte's Foods Inc. Thank you very much for appearing. You're free to go.

I just have some very short business to cover. I want to make sure this time around, as we agreed, that we will reduce our witnesses' time for testimony from 10 minutes to seven minutes. Because they had already submitted, we could not do it today, but the next meeting.... It will not be Tuesday, but next Friday, May 22, with Minister Bibeau present. I think, if that's all correct with you and there aren't any issues.... I think we had all agreed, but I don't know if there are any issues or questions on that.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

I have a question, Mr. Chairman.

Have my colleagues been able to consider my email response? I suggested that we modify our interventions to allow us to have a full second round of questions, even if it means having five minutes instead of six. That would be fair to everyone. That way, there could be two full rounds of questions.

Have you reviewed this proposal, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Yes. Since I only received it today, I haven't had a chance to send your message yet. I'm going to ask everyone if they want to reduce the time for each party to allow a second round. That is possible, but I have to have the agreement of all the parties.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

You can forward my email to my colleagues for them to read. It's not a problem for me if the decision is not made today. I invite my colleagues to consider my proposal. This would allow us to have a second round of questions and, more importantly, to have full rounds of questions.

I have one more quick question, Mr. Chairman. I know I'm being a pain today.

In the library document, it says—I hope this is a mistake of inattention—that the second part of today's meeting was devoted to small business. Am I mistaken?

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

I'll have to check with the clerk.