Agriculture Committee on May 25th, 2021

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

Thank you.

You talked about unfortunate and regrettable events that could happen if there were no regulation. Some producers might decide to take the law into their own hands.

Beyond that, I would also like you to talk about the mental health of producers.

[Keith Currie]

By nature, farming or ranching is a stressful job because of all of the elements that are out of our control. However, when you pile on top of it the opportunity for activists to come on your property without permission to potentially not only endanger your buildings by breaking in but also affect all of your livestock either through bringing in a disease or simply letting them go.... Animals like mink don't typically do well out in the outdoor environment, so if you open up a barn at a mink farm and let them all go, they are not going to survive, yet the people who do that don't get charged with animal cruelty.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you. Unfortunately, that is all the time.

Mr. MacGregor, go ahead for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Currie, in one of your earlier exchanges, you made mention of the fact that, in many cases, farmers have just kind of given up on reporting to the authorities because there is such a sorry track record of investigation and follow-through to an eventual conviction. Did I hear you right on that?

[Keith Currie]

You are right, by and large, and I should clarify that I'm dealing with my experience here, mostly in Ontario.

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

Okay. I am just wondering whether maybe the answer we need is more police resources. My community is facing the same thing. Sometimes the RCMP have their hands full with an opioid crisis, and they don't always get to property-related crime because we're down 11 members in our RCMP detachment.

Do you think that might also be a solution? You can pass all the laws you want, but if you don't have the police to enforce them, you're not really going to get much traction.

[Keith Currie]

Yes, I would say that's a fair statement, and I also would agree with Dr. Stark's earlier comment about the CFIA's also needing better resources to enable it to do its job on the enforcement end as well. However, police services certainly are lacking in funding to adequately give us support in rural Canada.

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

Thank you.

Dr. Stark, our committee did receive a letter from Humane Canada, an organization that I'm sure you are very well aware of and have worked with over your many years of service. Of course, it is the federation of all the SPCA organizations across Canada. It has written a letter stating quite clearly that it is against Bill C-205.

Do you have any comment on when an organization that is tasked with enforcing animal welfare on farms comes out against the bill we are studying? Do you have any comment to add to that, or does that elicit any reaction from you?

[Dr. Deb Stark]

I have worked with Humane Canada, which is actually the group that sits at the table, or has in the past, in the development of the national farm animal codes, as Mr. Currie talked about. As you say, it is an umbrella, a voluntary organization of animal protection groups, animal care groups and humane societies. I'm not aware that it, itself, has any mandate to enforce any kind of legislation or has any resources to do so.

Am I surprised that it has said no? I don't know. I'm not close enough to understand how it makes decisions within its organization. I know it represents a lot of animal welfare organizations, and I'm sure it's not easy for it to come to consensus on many of the positions that it takes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Dr. Stark, and Mr. MacGregor.

Unfortunately, that's all the time we have. It was a very interesting conversation.

I want to thank Dr. Deb Stark for appearing as an individual. Thanks for your experience and knowledge.

Of course, Mr. Currie with the Federation of Agriculture, thank you so much for your help on this study as well.

With that, we'll break for a couple of minutes and then we'll be right back with the second panel. We'll suspend just for time to change the panel.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

We will now welcome the second panel of witnesses.

We have Dr. Jean-Pierre Vaillancourt, full professor at the University of Montreal, appearing as an individual.

Welcome to our committee, Dr. Vaillancourt.

We also welcome Rick Bergmann, chair of the board of directors of the Canadian Pork Council, as well as René Roy, first vice-chair of the board of directors.

We welcome you both to our committee.

We also welcome David Duval, president of the Éleveurs de porcs du Québec.

We will give you each five minutes to make your presentation.

Dr. Vaillancourt, you have the floor.

[Dr. Jean-Pierre Vaillancourt, Full Professor, Université de Montréal, As an Individual]

Thank you.

I'm going to be fairly brief, since I provided a document. I will speak in French, but I will respond in English to questions that are asked in English.

In my brief, I mentioned three points. I will add a fourth. When there is intrusion into facilities, there are risks to animal welfare. We don't always know what the consequences of intrusion will be, depending on the species, but some animals can get injured and stressed to the point where their immune systems are affected and then they have more infections or infection-related problems.

For example, a person who doesn't know how to move around a poultry facility may very well kill some of them, because the poultry might crowd into corners and panic. We see this and we see it in swine production as well, where sows can get upset and crush their young.

Infectious diseases are one of the risks, among others. Contrary to what I heard a few minutes ago, you don't have to be near an infected animal to infect others. I can talk about this later.

Every visit carries a risk, including reportable diseases such as African swine fever and avian influenza, which is highly pathogenic. This is well documented. Obviously, diseases are not brought in every time there is an intrusion.

The risk is also well documented for endemic diseases, such as porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, or PRRS. In addition, infectious bronchitis and laryngotracheitis, for example, are other diseases that can have an impact.

There is also a risk to the people themselves. People who enter the premises of a farm and don't know what they're doing can become contaminated with bacteria, such as salmonella, or campylobacteriosis or Q fever. There are different situations where they can even injure themselves.

The fourth point I would like to make is based on my experience as a professor at North Carolina State University, in the U.S. On September 11, 2001, when the Department of Homeland Security was created, I was approached by a member of congress who told me that while the towers were falling in New York City, two farms in the Midwest were victims of bioterrorism. It was not al-Qaeda that did it, it was people who purposely contaminated two farms because they were angry at a farmer. So there is that possibility as well.

We often think of people who act to further animal rights, want to protect them or free them, but there are also people who are willing to go quite far in the opposite direction.

Let me give you the example of the former sister-in-law of a rancher in North Carolina, who decided one night when it was 40^o C in July to turn off the water because she was angry at the producer. Thousands of birds then died within hours.

So there can be consequences due to the transmission of infectious pathogens, but there can also be other problems that are not necessarily infectious and can also be caused by people who don't belong on the farm premises.

I would also like to make a comment. We read the text of a Quebec veterinarian who, by the way, lacks veterinary ethics. In fact, he has been singled out for this, because he is not shy about stating that veterinarians who work in animal production lack ethics. He is a militant antispeciesist vegan activist.

You may be a bona fide veterinarian, but you have to be careful. He is an extremist whom I denounce.

I will stop now to give others time to speak.

Thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Dr. Vaillancourt.

I will now turn the floor over to the Canadian Pork Council representatives, Mr. Bergmann and Mr. Roy.

Gentlemen, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Rick Bergmann, Chair of the Board of Directors, Canadian Pork Council]

Thank you for that.

Thank you for this opportunity to appear before the House of Commons. Bill C-205 is very important for Canadian pork producers. My name is Rick Bergmann. I'm a producer from Manitoba, and today I'm joined by René Roy, a producer from Quebec.

The Canadian Pork Council’s on-farm program, called Canadian pork excellence, is based on HACCP principles. Food safety and biosecurity are all intertwined, and the adoption of stringent biosecurity protocols is a vital component of every producer’s plan to keep their animals healthy and safe.

Pork producers are investing significant amounts of money to improve infrastructure, including significant improvements in barns, traceability and measures to limit who can access a hog barn, all to improve biosecurity controls. At the end of the day, the focus is to keep animals safe.

Still, unauthorized entries onto our hog farms are one of the greatest threats to biosecurity. Over the past several years, as I'm sure is not new to you, we have seen an alarming increase in unauthorized entry on farms, with individuals illegally entering our barns and other farm properties. That is very disturbing. These incidents put us, animals, and the entire food supply at risk. The reason we have so many stringent controls over the access to our barns is to reduce the devastating risks that several diseases could have for the industry.

Using my own farm as an example, a disease like PED or PRRS would cost my farm, which is not a large farm, between $260,000 and $320,000, very significant money, a significant cost and detriment.

The most concerning is African swine fever, which is an industry-killing disease. The cost of responding to and recovering from an ASF outbreak would be measured in billions of dollars for all our producers combined. Biosecurity is our best defence against the disease, and unauthorized entries put us all at risk.

I invite René Roy, my colleague, to say a few words at this time.

[René Roy, First Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors, Canadian Pork Council]

Thank you, Rick.

Our investments in time, energy and money are not enough to prevent unauthorized entries. Bill C-205 provides a means to deter trespassers who might expose animals to unnecessary stress, potential disease or toxic substances.

We underscore our commitment to being transparent with consumers in Canada and around the world. Transparency is essential for consumers to have confidence in how pork is produced, including ensuring that producers are living up to the high standards they set for animal health and welfare.

Bill C-205 is not an attempt to limit transparency on our farms but an attempt to protect animal health and welfare. We regularly speak to Canadians from coast to coast. We make it one of our top priorities to answer all people’s questions about how pork is produced, including questions on animal welfare.

Passing Bill C-205 will provide confidence to producers that their animals will not be put at risk by illegal trespassers who do not care or respect pigs, their health and welfare, and the health and welfare of their family pork producers.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Roy.

We will now continue with Mr. Duval, president, Les Éleveurs de porcs du Québec.

Mr. Duval, you have the floor for five minutes.

[David Duval, President, Les Éleveurs de porcs du Québec]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ladies and gentlemen members of the House, good afternoon.

I am extremely pleased to appear before you today to represent Quebec pork producers and to speak to you about the issues related to the bill, which should be passed.

Our organization represents more than 1,700 producers, who market seven million processed hogs in Quebec per year. Quebec is the largest pork producing province, and our sector is the second largest agri-food sector in Quebec. Hog production in Quebec contributes $1.13 billion annually to GDP and generates $1.8 billion in farm gate sales. Hog farms employ some 14,000 people, and more than 30,000 families make their living from the Quebec pork industry. Quebec farmers are proud to meet 80% of the local demand for fresh meat, with Quebec's self-sufficiency rate for pork at around 400%. By comparison, the self-sufficiency rate for blueberries is about 300%, for cranberries it is 490%, and for maple syrup 1300%.

We are therefore very proud to export most of our production to other countries, mainly to countries where natural resources cannot allow for sustainable farming like ours in Quebec. Between 2009 and 2020, the value of Quebec's pork exports rose from $975 million to $2.1 billion. This is an impressive average annual growth rate of 7.25%.

This is in keeping with the Zero Hunger Challenge and the Responsible Consumption and Production goals of the United Nations 2030 Agenda, to which Canada has signed on. All of this is to tell you that the pork industry and other agricultural industries in Canada are extremely important and must be protected by legislation.

Of course, hog producers face many risks, as we heard earlier, risks involving diseases that must be avoided at all costs. I don't know if any of you have ever visited a hog farm, but in most cases, not just anyone can enter. Before entering, you have to sign a register. You must change your boots and clothes, shower, keep to a sanitary area and respect the biosecurity rules, as well as animal welfare inside the farm. These rules are important. It took several years to put them in place with the different stakeholders who supported us in this regard.

So the biosecurity rules are very much present and very much followed. It's mainly about the health of the animals. On the farm, the pigs' environment is calm and stress-free. Welfare standards even recommend toys and music for the animals.

When a group of agitated people rush inside our farms, the animal is definitely experiencing stress. This does not just apply to pigs. It's the same for rabbits and other animals, which can even die instantly when people who ignore these rules enter these farms. So the consequences of breaking and entering are many. The stress on the producers is also enormous, as we saw recently on a farm. I personally know the family that operates that farm, a young family that just got into pork production in 2019.

However, the law doesn't see it that way, not in Quebec nor in other provinces. If you look at the laws in Quebec and in some Canadian provinces, you don't find anything that deals specifically with livestock. We have to try to defend ourselves with general laws in the Criminal Code or the Civil Code, and that is extremely difficult and costly for us.

This bill sends a clear message, from coast to coast: you don't go onto a farm without permission, period. It's not a matter of whether the farmer has put up a sign, put up a gate, or locked his doors. You don't have the right to enter a farm, it doesn't happen without permission.

This bill is essential and is in line with the demands made by hog farmers in Quebec and Canada, and by my colleagues in all other agricultural sectors over the years.

We also need to think about the threat posed by African swine fever. This is a disease that has decimated half of China's livestock industry in recent years. In Quebec, it would be devastating, as it would be throughout Canada.

It was mostly international travellers who contaminated farms in the rest of the world, whether in Germany, Belgium or elsewhere.

We need to be extremely careful. A single case detected in Canada would jeopardize the survival of Canada's 7,000 pork producers. Quebec and Canada would lose an important economic sector, and achieving various objectives would become very difficult.

This disease is just one example of why unauthorized entries into a farm should be regulated in the manner proposed by Bill C-205.

This legislative proposal is essential to the survival of a strong and economically important agricultural sector.

Thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Duval.

We'll move on to the first round of questions.

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

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being with us this afternoon. We appreciate it. They have provided many answers to questions that we had.

Let's get back to the issue of African swine fever.

Mr. Duval, do you believe that the biosecurity measures currently taken by producers in Quebec and Canada are sufficient, if there are no break-ins, to protect their farms from African swine fever?

[David Duval]

It is clear that for producers in Quebec and Canada, the introduction of this disease will not be on a farm protected by the biosecurity measures we currently have in place. It is really in external farms that it could happen. However, with the rules that we have in place, it won't be that easy for an outbreak to occur within our herds, unless there are break-ins. We know that this has happened in other countries, and that's the part we're missing. It could put this sector of the Canadian economy at risk from coast to coast.

The adoption of these measures would make us safer.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

What I also understand, Mr. Duval, is that Quebec does not currently have legislation specifically addressing this issue.

Would Quebec pork companies be better positioned if Bill C-205 were to come into force?

[David Duval]

No current legislation focuses primarily on the agriculture sector. I've heard some references to existing legislation, but those laws apply to the housing sector. In terms of agriculture, no legislation helps us with this.

I'll give you an example. There was a recent break-in at a hog farm in Saint-Hyacinthe. It took seven hours of discussions with the minister and various lawyers to determine how to remove the 10 or 15 people who had entered the farm in a dishonest manner.

In Quebec, there aren't any regulations. I know that some other provinces don't have any either. Some provinces have been much more proactive in introducing tougher legislation, but several provinces don't have any legislation at all.

That's why it would be very good for us to have legislation that applies to the whole country.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

Mr. Duval, is the young company that you just spoke about the one that you gave as an example before you finished your remarks?

[David Duval]

It's the same example. It isn't a young company. They're young parents, with children under the age of five, who had just bought a farm. The farm was in the development stage, because it needed some renovations. However, they complied with all the standards for animal welfare.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

Can you speak briefly about the potential collateral damage to a family such as the one you just referred to?