Evidence of meeting #33 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 lévêque.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Okay. Thank you, Mr. Lévêque.
I will go back to the question Mr. MacGregor put to you earlier.
How do you see the potential partnership between traditional agriculture and organic agriculture, which comes with all these practices? You will understand that, across Canada, the goal is to improve all the practices and reduce the climate footprint for everyone. How can your sector help by moving forward with the more traditional sector?
Part Owner, Jardins de l'écoumène
One of the ways to do that is through education. Research must continue to be done and access to those technologies must be provided.
For example, in Denmark, a small corridor was invented to enable bees to grab a fungus that is transported directly into a strawberry's flower to help combat fungal diseases. I refer to this as nature's intelligence. Humans can work intelligently with nature, but that requires research and people who are working to develop technologies.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
You talked about a product you developed, biochar. What obstacles have you come upon, and what could the federal government do to facilitate innovation? The goal is actually to facilitate innovation.
Part Owner, Jardins de l'écoumène
Generally speaking, anything to do with food inspection is complex, including the registration of products. Biochar was part of that, but over time, the Canadian Parliament has facilitated the commercialization of biochar. You did very good work in that respect.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Thank you, Mr. Lévêque.
Mr. MacGregor, you have two and a half minutes.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Bertrand, I have two questions for you.
First, I'll echo Mr. Blois's comments. It's nice to see the private sector taking the lead with research dollars into this area. I assume this is being driven by consumer demands. We've seen a shift in consumers who just want to see companies engaging in this a bit more.
Can you just briefly answer that?
Director, Procurement, Raw and Packs, Danone Inc.
Yes, definitely.
Consumers are demanding more and more products where they can see where it comes from and how it's made. Consumers are more and more educated. As Mr. Lévêque said, those who are 30 and younger easily jump on anything to try to understand where food comes from.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
That's for sure.
My second question is really also on the research vein. A couple of years ago, I toured an Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada research station in Summerland, in the Okanagan in British Columbia. I spent half a day there and was very impressed with the calibre of federal scientists we have working not only in plant-based agriculture but also with animals.
With respect to regenerative agriculture, we ultimately want to make recommendations to the federal government. Would you like to see Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada increase its budget to study regenerative agriculture and to maybe plot the status of Canada's soils, such as their carbon sequestration potential, etc.? Is this something where the federal government could be of incredible use?
Director, Procurement, Raw and Packs, Danone Inc.
It could, for sure.
In my introduction, when I said the coordination effort, that's one of those. I have seen some maps from Agriculture Canada's research people that show where soils are degraded and where soils are in better shape. It's essential that these maps, these learnings and this science information are active in real time. It can help the farmers to make the right decisions.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
Thank you very much.
I'll leave it there, Mr. Chair.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Pat Finnigan
Thank you, Mr. MacGregor.
I'll just make a little statement, because I'm also a certified organic grower, but I have been a conventional grower.
I do not want to criticize conventional producers, as I used to be one myself. Moreover, any effort to reduce the carbon footprint is important.
I understand having to pay to gain organic certification. I have worked in organic agriculture and in conventional agriculture, and I think we are all moving toward a better world.
I thank the Danone representatives, Jean-Marc Bertrand, director of procurement, and Isabelle Rayle-Doiron. I also thank Jean-François Lévêque, from Jardins de l'écoumène.
To all our committee members, thanks for being here. Enjoy the rest of the week and we shall see you, not next week, but the following week.
Thank you, everyone, and have a good weekend.
(Meeting adjourned)