Agriculture Committee on Nov. 24th, 2020

[Todd Lewis]

It's just that I think offshore product coming into Canada really affects Canadian producers. It's important that we keep that production in Canada and use it for Canadians.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

You raised two major issues, transportation and slaughter capacity.

What solutions do you suggest for the lack of slaughter capacity?

How could the federal government help? Would easing regulations make it possible to open more abattoirs across the country?

[Todd Lewis]

Well, I think it's probably not much unlike what Ms. Stafford talked about on Vancouver Island. The small abattoirs in Saskatchewan also disappeared because they couldn't compete. The large CFIA-approved slaughter facilities in Alberta get most of the cattle. Because of that, that's the market for cattle. They can't export interprovincially unless they go to a CFIA-approved facility. We don't have one in Saskatchewan, so that really hurt our abattoirs, and a lot of them closed up.

Then COVID happened. We had shutdowns of those major plants and nowhere, no local abattoirs, to take that product. I think that's an example of how if we had better regulations, if we had less regulation, if it were easier to go across provincial boundaries, we would have a stronger system and a system of smaller abattoirs, as well as the big slaughterhouses. There should be room for both.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

What you're saying is very important. The smaller and larger slaughter facilities must be able to compete with each other in the market.

I have a question about transportation. You said we needed more containers. Will transport routes, including the rail network, be able to support the added transportation?

[Todd Lewis]

I think we need to see increased rail capacity. It's ongoing. As we have higher and higher production models and opportunities, I think we need to see more and more rail capacity. It's important.

Port capacity is another issue, certainly. The Port of Vancouver is getting full. The more product goes through there, the more congestion is going to occur.

I think transportation is a very important part. We need to see continued support to increase capacity on our rail lines.

[Richard Lehoux, Conservative, Beauce, QC]

I understand what you're saying about rail transportation. Where ports are concerned, however, whether it's Vancouver or Ontario, they have issues in terms of their capacity to ship our goods.

[Todd Lewis]

Yes, since COVID we've had increased capacity for grain movement. We've had record movement over the last number of months, but at the same time, as the economy starts to recover, we're going to see loss of some of that capacity. It's going to go to other products.

The grain sector has an opportunity now when we should be able to export all the product we have. The world wants it. It's high-quality. We're sure hoping that the rail capacity will be able to handle what we should be able to export, and that the same thing is going to happen if we increase our processing within this country, because we will have to have transportation to get to market.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Lewis.

Thank you, Mr. Lehoux.

We'll continue with Mr. Louis for five minutes.

[Tim Louis, Liberal, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank the witnesses for their time and their testimony. It's very informative.

Ms. Stafford, thank you for taking the lead on that with the land acknowledgement, because you know that we are all across the country here, so I wouldn't mind taking the time to say that here in Kitchener—Conestoga, in this region of Ontario, I'm on the traditional lands of the Anishinabe, the Haudenosaunee and the Neutral peoples, so I appreciate your leadership in that. That was kind of you.

One thing I notice as I look at my notes here is your strong relationship with the local food producers and the local farmers. It's really rewarding to hear, and it's the same feel as in my community here. That relationship you have, which I saw on the website when I researched you, is so important to our well-being, and it really makes a difference as far as including our processing capacity is concerned.

We have companies here in Kitchener—Conestoga, like Enviro-Stewards, that are working with food manufacturers, helping them reduce food loss, and doing some of the same projects that you're doing in your own riding, which I appreciate.

Also, you mentioned the commercial transport van and a refrigerated truck. Again, we have Wilmot Family Resource Centre here, Woolwich Community Health Centre, and Community Support Connections, which is our Meals on Wheels. It's always nice to share best practices and how we can make the most of our food.

We were looking at food waste as part of the processing issue. Can you explain how that refrigerated truck and the transport van you have would work and how you are able to share the food that exists?

[Judy Stafford]

Our van is on the road all day. First of all, it drives around in the mornings and goes to the local grocery stores, as I mentioned. Other food producers will call us, or farmers will call us if they have a glut. Especially during the summertime, we would drive by several farms as well and pick up whatever they weren't able to sell, and we'd give tax receipts for that.

Then it comes back to.... Right now, because of COVID, it's back in our central location. If we were using a warehouse...so it's a bit chaotic, to be honest, because it's a shared space. It's all sorted. We do get some that is compost, so we work with farmers and we also distribute anything that's not edible. Then everything else is distributed. We have 25 local food organizations, The Salvation Army, food banks and shelters. The temporary housing sites we're working with right now all get boxes every day. Again, anything that is not quite up to par is turned into Meals on Wheels.

We also process frozen meals that we sell in our low-cost grocery store. One of our suppliers does allow us to sell the food, so we do sell the food as a social enterprise, and that pays for staffing to operate a food store. Through that, we distribute about 10,000 dollars' worth of food in a coupon. People can still come in and shop, but they're on a list, so they're not actually giving us money. That is a very, very critical program since COVID. We started it for two months and now we're however many months in, but it is expensive. Some of the food is purchased by folks in the community. We have 100 families in that program right now.

The food really gets around. Nothing goes to waste. Anything we can't use gets picked up by farmers.

[Tim Louis, Liberal, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

That was my next question, too, about the food that doesn't get used. Does it get distributed? I mean, even for Halloween we had local pumpkins out in the neighbourhoods, and then someone collected them and delivered them to a local hog farmer. And yes, it's the same across the country. It's nice to know that our farmers are calling you and other organizations and saying, “We have some food”, and with your truck now you can come and pick it up.

I was hoping you could share best practices and how to make the most of the food that's out there, so I appreciate that.

[Judy Stafford]

Yes, and it's a lot of food. I tried getting this program running in 2011, so I'm dismayed that it took us that long because of regulations, but now we're all set to go. The Good Samaritan Act and other acts have been put in place so people can donate the food without having repercussions.

[Tim Louis, Liberal, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Yes, I appreciate your saying that.

In the time I have left, Mr. Lewis, you mentioned increasing broadband. I know this pandemic has shown that broadband is absolutely essential. As we're talking about processing, this might be a good time for you to give some specific examples of how investments in broadband could help the agriculture industry in their ways of scaling up in any way. Maybe that can help shape how we actually lay this out.

[Todd Lewis]

I think processing in the new plants will have to be really in remote parts of this country. When we talk about broadband in a province like Saskatchewan.... A town of 2,000 people might be considered a hamlet in Ontario, for instance, but it's a major trading hub in our province. In a town like Tisdale, Saskatchewan, you go 15 minutes outside of the town and there's virtually no Internet coverage. I think it's really going to be a detriment to getting these plants built if they don't have that hooked up. It's just as important as electricity or natural gas.

[The Chair, Liberal, Pat Finnigan]

Thank you, Mr. Louis.

Now we'll go to Mr. Perron.

You have the floor for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will go back to Ms. Stafford.

You spoke earlier about a mobile abattoir project you submitted. Have you applied for a grant? Did you run into any problems? Is the process involving the Canadian Food Inspection Agency difficult? Tell me a little about your situation.

[Judy Stafford]

The mobile abattoir actually is a provincial fund that I've applied to. I just sent it in, so I don't know what the process is going to be. It was $561,000 to set up a mobile abattoir here in Cowichan.

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

What could the federal government do to facilitate this kind of project?

This is an interesting project, especially since we are currently working on the local processing issue. Could the federal government participate financially in this project?

[Judy Stafford]

Sure, I'll take $561,000 from anybody. If the feds want to give me that, I'll gladly put your sign on it.

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

Of course.

[Judy Stafford]

There isn't a fund that I'm aware of right now with the federal government that would cover that cost. That was too high a cost to go through the local infrastructure fund, because that maxed out at $250,000.

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

Okay.

Mr. Lewis, you're talking about changes to be made in slaughter facilities for interprovincial trade. What quick and easy changes could be made?

[Todd Lewis]

A simple one would be just a standardization of regulations between the provinces and the federal government. If the province of Saskatchewan has an approved facility, there should be a fast track to get interprovincial trade. It can even begin just on adjacent provinces and then move it out from there.

I think we've been way too long with non-standardization in these regulations. It really has been a detriment to establishing new processing facilities.

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

All right.

From what I understand, you would like to see smaller scale processing centres closer to your production centres. Is that correct?

[Todd Lewis]

Yes, that's correct. It checks a lot of different boxes, if you want to put it that way, for animal welfare and so on. The animals are travelling shorter distances to processing, so that's just an example of one of the advantages of smaller—