Evidence of meeting #20 for Agriculture and Agri-Food in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was standards.
A recording is available from Parliament.
General Manager, Canards du Lac Brome ltée
We're on the same page when it comes to automation support. As I said earlier, we're at a level where we're talking about large sums of money, costs that our industry can't absorb because we don't have a lot of players. So we need very targeted support in that regard.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Do you think something could be done about research and development? We were told by people in the academic community that the facilities were relatively outdated for these activities.
General Manager, Canards du Lac Brome ltée
There would indeed be a lot to do in research and development. I think we can boast of being leaders in the market, but there's still a lot to be done in this industry and it comes back again to the question of access to funds.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Thank you, Mr. O'Shaughnessy.
Now we'll go to Mr. MacGregor for two and a half minutes.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
Thank you, Chair.
Mr. O'Shaughnessy, I think I'll turn to you with a question along the same lines as the one I had for Mr. Falk during my last intervention. If you want, maybe you could even expand upon it.
It's really just about the difficulties that were expressed, such as the struggle in finding access to capital. We've also heard a lot about the strategic investments that could be made by the federal government to help our processing sector. If we were to look at a federal Crown corporation similar to Farm Credit Canada to be in the business of being a lender and if we looked at specific recommendations we can make for how it operates, does it need to take more of a chance or explore different sectors with greater vigour? Is there anything you can add to that for our report, please?
General Manager, Canards du Lac Brome ltée
The market offers great opportunities. Our product has a lot of potential because it meets all trends, especially in health and dietary diversity. However, as I said in my statement, it would be costly to develop our industry if we are the only ones to invest. It would be unfair to have only one player investing in the industry when all the others would just take advantage of it and answer the phone. When we talk about investments, it would be good for the government to be involved so that everyone can benefit.
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, I think I'll just leave it there.
To both of our witnesses, thank you for your contributions to our study.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.
That will wrap up our panel portion.
To Mr. Ken Falk, from Fraser Valley Specialty Poultry, thank you for coming here today and telling your story.
We would also like to thank Mr. O'Shaughnessy from Canards du Lac Brome ltée for his presence here.
With that, I would remind the members that we'll have to switch off and then come back for the in camera portion of our business session. You have your password and everything, so I'll suspend the meeting and we'll log off and come back in camera.
Thank you so much, everyone.
[Proceedings continue in camera]