Agriculture Committee on Oct. 8th, 2024

[Leah Taylor Roy, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you very much. I just want to say thank you for being part of the organics movement. I know that, if we are all concerned about our vitamins and nutrients, organics have a higher quantity of a lot of that than some of the mass-produced food that doesn't use organics, so I'm sure that will be of interest.

Again, I think we can look at the idea of helping the organics sector more because it will do very well in the future, when all the countries are going to be looking at the carbon intensity of production and environmental compliance.

[Tia Loftsgard]

I would like to share it with the committee, after this, but there's a new nutrient density study that has come out of the Rodale Institute, which is absolutely fascinating. It's cutting-edge research that actually shows the larger number of nutrients grown in organic food, in multiple crops.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

Thank you very much. We're at time.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being with us today.

Mr. Charlebois, my main concerns are having reciprocal standards and maintaining our local food resilience. We've talked about this before.

During the committee's last meetings, we heard from our fruit and vegetable producers. They came to explain to us that despite all their efforts, their hands are tied in certain situations. Let's take as an example carrots from Mexico coming into the country. We do not know what these vegetables have been sprayed with, and they are banned in the United States.

How do we support our producers in such situations?

How can we protect our producers and ensure that the rules and inspections they have to comply with are the same as those imposed on producers who export their products to Canada, without increasing the cost of food?

[Dr. Sylvain Charlebois]

Thank you for the question.

I'm pro‑international trade. We have agreements with various countries around the world because we want to maintain food affordability in Canada. Canadian consumers benefit from carrots that are cheaper, mainly because they come from elsewhere.

In terms of Mexican rules, standards and equivalencies, you have to understand that they are not the same as in Canada. We are well aware that Canadian and Quebec producers are also investing in the United States and Mexico. Investments are made on both sides. International trade is defined in all sorts of ways.

I've always believed that farming in Canada is a competitive business. Currently, a lot of people use a penalty system instead of offering incentives to increase performance.

I would like to come back to the discussion we had earlier. It is important to make our agricultural practices greener. Eventually, the rest of the world will follow.

We can't have it all at once, but the biggest issue we have right now is food affordability. If we take action at the border, we risk hurting Canadian consumers.

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

However, if we don't have a level playing field, there might not be any producers left in five or 10 years.

What I understand from your answer is that the solution would be to put incentives in place. I have been advocating for such measures for some time, such as environmental stewardship accreditation, financial incentives to improve performance and better supports.

You talked about the study you did on the cost of food in the United States and Canada. It mentions the issue of supports. In Canada, these are few and far between.

[Dr. Sylvain Charlebois]

We need to have those discussions as well, Mr. Perron. Support for farmers is absolutely crucial when we talk about supporting our agricultural sector to make it more competitive.

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

We agree on one thing. In the current situation, we are really asking a lot of our producers whilst offering no support whatsoever by letting in products that do not meet the same standards as the ones Canadian producers have to meet. This is not a situation that is sustainable in the long term.

[Dr. Sylvain Charlebois]

I agree with you on that point.

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

Ms. Loftsgard, please provide us with more details on what you are asking for in your three proposals.

With respect to the Organic Products Regulations, the review of organic standards is not officially overseen by the state, but it should be, because the standards are national. We fought for this, and we managed to get the funding.

Next time, will we get an act? We are always having to start over, because the government doesn't want to make a long‑term commitment.

What would be in this act? What would it contain?

[Tia Loftsgard]

Thank you very much for the question. It's a great question. It's something we've been wanting to engage in.

For 15 years now, we've been regulated—

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

I'll just stop you there.

I have stopped the clock. I will continue to talk in English until Monsieur Perron can hear this.

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

I can hear you now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

All right.

It's over to you, Ms. Loftsgard.

[Tia Loftsgard]

When organic first got regulated, it was under the organic products regulation under the agriculture act. When we got merged with the SFCR, the safe food for Canadians regulations, it all became around food safety. Many people said that they just didn't know what to do with organic, so they put us in there as part 13.

In other jurisdictions, they've actually created an act that's a stand-alone act that can play on not just the enforcement aspect. It should be around market development. That is how the United States has positioned organic. It's a market development opportunity. It's not only because consumers want it. It's also an opportunity to develop small to medium-sized producers. It allows for there to be crosscutting. Right now we kind of get in a silo where there is no policy directive at Agriculture Canada for organic, because it's really just about the enforcement side of things.

We run into silos, I would say, when it comes to working with Environment Canada, Health Canada and Global Affairs when it comes to organic, because there are no real policy directives. This is where we're looking at some of our trade partners. I will tell you that every single one of our trade partners has a stand-alone act.

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

You say there are no real guidelines, but we still have standards that allow organic products to be certified.

What further guidance are you waiting for?

[Tia Loftsgard]

It's not about the standards. The standards will always remain incorporated by reference into the safe food for Canadians regulations. It's more about the infrastructure of our Government of Canada and the approach they have. I mean, I don't even know if this is a good example, but there's a fertilizer act. There's no organic act. The Fertilizers Act actually allows us to be crosscutting across various forms of different legislation.

This is something that I think we should really give some consideration to. It's something that we'll be coming to speak to our politicians about on November 18. We've requested meetings with many of our MPs to spell out exactly what that would look like. We're working with somebody who will be building out the framework.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

We're at time. Thank you.

Mr. MacGregor, we knew we couldn't keep you away for long. Welcome back.

It's over to you for six minutes.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I had to come back to keep an eye on you folks to make sure everything was okay.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

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

Thank you to all of our witnesses. This is actually a pretty fascinating study. It seems like we're very much dealing with a hypothetical scenario. Basically, a what-if question is before us. I do appreciate the three of you who are guiding the committee through this study.

Maybe I will start with you, Mr. Cosbey. I think it's quite obvious that agriculture occupies a very special place in our economy. Many people recognize that. I think you can even see it in federal legislation like the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, which does have exemptions carved out for farming activities, farming machinery and qualifying farm fuels. I think you can see that also as a result of the majority of the House of Commons supporting a bill like Bill C-234. I think it was very much in the spirit of those existing exemptions.

Due to the fact that we're dealing with a hypothetical scenario, what I would like to know is this. Often when we're trying to think up a policy, I don't think there's enough attention paid to the good that agriculture is doing, to the good farming practices, because we know that, depending on how one farms, it can have a tremendous impact on not only the emissions but also the carbon capture that the farm is able to do. I guess I'd like to have your expertise here.

In a hypothetical scenario where we're having these conversations between the EU and Canada, how would the various parties come to an agreement on how we measure the capacity of good agricultural practices to capture carbon? Is there an agreed-upon standard that we could...?

I guess I'd just like to hear your thoughts to guide our committee on those conversations.

[Aaron Cosbey]

The complexities that you're getting into here are one of the reasons why I don't expect we're going to see agriculture covered by a CBAM-like instrument anytime soon. It's one thing to say that we're going to charge you for every tonne embedded in your steel production, because we know how much fuel is going in. We know the emissions factors involved in processing. We can pretty much estimate what your greenhouse gas intensity of operations is. It's a completely different thing if we're talking about agriculture as an activity where, as you say, you have soil carbon being either retained or emitted, depending on the differences in practices. You have application of fertilizer, which could, depending on how you apply it, have quite different emissions-intensity profiles. These are the complications that I think would absolutely....

Let me give you an example of why I don't think that could happen. I know I'm not answering your question directly, but the EU did not include chemicals in the CBAM. Why not? This is a highly emissions-intensive, trade-exposed sector. It didn't include chemicals, because the downstream value chain in chemicals is insanely complicated. Once you get beyond the six basic plastics— everything downstream in there—you have thousands and thousands of products. Moreover it's difficult to understand how you allocate emissions to all the different products that might come out of a single facility. That complexity made them back off and say that they weren't even going to cover it.

I think you face the same kind of complexity in the context of agriculture, and moreover a political unwillingness to subject European agriculture to direct inclusion under the EU ETS. Therefore, there is no legal route to including it in the CBAM. However, if you did that, it would have to be a process of bilateral negotiation between the EU and Canada on how you figure out the emissions factors and what assumptions you make in terms of carbon uptake and emissions—they need to be different practices. It would have to be a vastly complicated negotiation. There's no straightforward answer to that question.

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

Thank you for that.

Dr. Charlebois, would you like to chime in?

In order for us to make a good policy in these areas, we of course need to have a good dataset underpinning it all, particularly when it comes to the variety of Canada's soils and the different mechanisms that are used with farming. We are a very regional country. We have very different farming cultures depending on what province you're in.

Do you have anything you can add to that, like the challenge that would exist in trying to frame this discussion between both sides of the Atlantic?

[Dr. Sylvain Charlebois]

Absolutely. It's a great question.

I firmly agree with Mr. Cosbey. I think it would be extremely difficult to measure.

I've actually mentioned before this committee many times that there is also a huge deficit in Canada when it comes to agricultural practices. To actually get access to all the data that would be required to negotiate with our trading partners would be extremely challenging. You would have to collect all that data, and then sit at the table with our trading partners and come to some sort of an agreement, which would be fairly complex to do and very costly as well.

I do agree with Mr. Cosbey in that it's probably why I don't think agriculture would be included or covered by CBAM at all. I'm fairly confident. I hope we're right, but I do think it would be extremely complicated to move forward with data collection and all the things you would need to properly negotiate.

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

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, it sounds like a great rationale for a national soil strategy. I'll conclude there.