I am here today with Chris Vervaet, as you mentioned, from the Canadian Oilseed Processors Association. Our two associations work very closely.
Competitiveness in the global export market is critical for the canola industry. We export 90% of what we produce in Canada, so we need to be competitive globally.
There's also a real opportunity for value-added processing in the canola sector. Canola can be exported in raw form as seed to be processed elsewhere, or it can be processed into canola oil and canola meal at Canadian facilities, creating jobs across the country and increasing the value of our product.
Value-added canola processing has been a real engine of growth for Canada's economy in recent years, and we can achieve a lot more. Our world-class canola processing industry has more than doubled in the last decade. More than $1.5 billion has been invested in new and upgraded facilities during this time, and the output from this additional capacity has been for global markets. The question is how to continue that success and continue to increase value-added processing here in Canada.
Our industry has a strategic plan to increase demand for canola oil, meal and seed and to meet that demand with sustainable production and yield improvement. As part of the plan, our industry has set an objective to increase the amount we process here in Canada by 40% from current levels, reaching 14 million tonnes.
Our plan also includes bold sustainability goals to protect more than 2,000 beneficial insects that live in and around canola fields, to reduce our fuel consumption per bushel of production and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It's an ambitious but achievable plan, and it will contribute significantly to the government's target of $75 billion in agricultural support through sustainable growth.
Reaching this target for increased value-added processing means that we must compete globally. The committee has asked how we can achieve more value-added processing and what the role of the federal government is. We have four recommendations for the committee to consider.
The first is that we need to create a stable and open trade by investing more resources, particularly in Asia, to prevent and deal with market access issues.
Let me just take a second to explain. We're seeing significant demand for our products in the fast-growing Asian markets, but we're also seeing an increased challenge from trade barriers that limit our access to those markets and make the trade unpredictable. For example, over the last five years our oil exports—our value-added product—to Asia grew by 80%, and our meal exports increased more than tenfold. Over the next five years, we see another 25% in potential growth.
The challenge we're having there is the risk created by unclear and misaligned food and feed safety regulations, fluctuating tariffs and misaligned regulations for crop protection products and seed innovation. These are real barriers to predictable trade.
We recommend that more government resources be assigned to market access issues, particularly in Asia—working in the region, in Asia. We need more regional resources to operate in a strategic and coordinated manner to maintain and build market access for Canada's agricultural products. This means more regulatory experts who can deal with the kinds of science-based issues that become technical barriers to our trade.
Our second issue is about efforts to prevent trade barriers related to seed innovation. We need the federal government to show leadership and create a science-based regulatory environment that encourages new seed innovation here in Canada. It's a very topical debate in this period of time, particularly with the framework for new plant-breeding innovation, such as gene-editing technology, which is critical to the future of our industry and really critical to advancing sustainable agriculture as well.
Third, we recommend the federal government continue to take leadership in maintaining reliable rail transportation. About 90% of canola is exported, and the rail system is critically important to the supply chain in accessing continental and offshore markets.
Competitive and efficient rail logistics are paramount to getting products to market in a timely fashion. We recommend that federal policies and regulations in this area continue to evolve to improve the competitive environment for rail services.
The government also has an important role to play in supporting and investing in key infrastructure access to help ensure reliable supply chains.
Finally, the fourth point and perhaps the one most immediately important to the committee in terms of its timeliness, is that we recommend that the government enable a market in Canada for biofuels that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support more value-added processing here at home.
Canola-based biofuels already help Canada significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90% compared with conventional petroleum diesel. With a proper regulatory design and recognition of canola's low-carbon advantages, the proposed federal clean fuel standard can spur more demand for canola oil and drive the expansion of a value-added sector. Even a modest level of 5% renewable content in diesel fuel would translate into a domestic market for more than 1.3 million tonnes of canola.
Biofuels are a good example of how canola delivers solutions for our economy and the environment. Canola plants—I don't mean manufacturing plants, but the plant itself—take carbon from the atmosphere and use it to make the world's healthiest oil, and biofuels and protein to feed animals, while at the same time sequestering carbon in the soil. It's a unique product in that way.
On behalf of our industry and the quarter million Canadians whose jobs depend on canola, we thank you for looking at the opportunities to increase processing capacity and competitiveness, and to sustainably increase canola's market access potential both through exports and through biofuels here in Canada.
Chris and I are looking forward to answering your questions, Mr. Chair. Thank you.