Agriculture Committee on March 31st, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

Thank you, Mr. MacLeod.

Thank you, Ms. Taylor Roy. We're at six minutes.

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

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. MacLeod, I would like to let you continue on with this.

If we could find a way to assess the environmental performance of soils—witnesses have told us that they have developed methods to do that—and reward producers for maintaining grasslands, do you feel it would be possible to stop the loss of grasslands and forage plants?

[Cedric MacLeod]

Yes, thanks for the question.

It's a bit of a complex challenge conversation to be had. I think it links to what the folks from CRSB have brought forward and the importance of maintaining a functional beef herd, which really dominates the use of our grasslands across Canada.

I am a beef producer myself and heavily involved with the beef sector here in the Maritimes. One thing we've advanced here is to have good forage insurance systems that allow us to compete head to head with our annual crop neighbours who have really solid protections around crop insurance.

The other one is cattle price insurance. That will help to backstop the profitability of the beef sector, which keeps cows on the landscape and keeps those grasslands intact.

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

Mr. MacLeod, if land is being converted for other uses, it's because it is more profitable for farmers.

Wouldn't rewarding farmers in some way for maintaining grasslands make a difference?

[Cedric MacLeod]

Yes, absolutely, and I think that idea has been raised in a number of the presentations. The significant value that those grasslands bring to the table for all Canadians needs to be recognized and firmly embedded in policy, and so you're correct. You know, there is a discrepancy in the profitability index on canola or wheat or corn or soybeans versus that on maintaining grasslands, so that needs to be addressed.

The financial incentive to cover that gap and recognize those EG&S values that the grasslands are bringing for all Canadians would be an essential contribution, for sure.

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

Mr. Thoroughgood, could the same principle be applied to your remnant habitats and wetlands?

[Paul Thoroughgood]

Absolutely. One of our points was about the idea of getting the data to monetize the values that those lands do produce, because right now they're effectively being produced at no charge by the agriculture sector and other landowners. We're pretty strongly convinced that if there were a monetary signal to protect habitat on your land and produce those environmental values that, much as farmers and ranchers produce grain and beef and that sort of thing, they would also produce those environmental values.

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

Ms. Stroeve‑Sawa, on a similar note, you said earlier that you also need to recognize how the land was used in the past.

If we start by measuring the environmental performance of the land and encouraging people who are making or have made efforts to do so, I imagine you would look favourably on that.

Wouldn't you?

[Andrea Stroeve-Sawa]

Thank you.

As I said before, recognizing the work of the people who have come before, we've been grazing grassland for 35 years and have seen an increase of 3,862% on our stock days per acre and an organic matter increase of over 6%.

Those things are quantifiable, but there's no reward for them. I personally am surrounded by cultivated land. I have four quarters that surround my land right now that have been cultivated in the last five years, and it's hard for us, for grassland, to compete with very high-value crops such as pumpkins and onions. Those are all very necessary, but it makes it really hard to justify the grassland when you're surrounded by very high-value crops that are getting very high return.

So monetizing that would be very beneficial, and monetizing the carbon that we are actually sequestering and holding within our grasslands is very important.

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

Obviously, it could also prevent land conversion.

You mentioned a methane-reducing product that hasn't been approved in Canada.

If you had one recommendation for the committee about this, what would it be?

[Andrea Stroeve-Sawa]

I would recommend clearing the regulatory pathway for feed additives to receive an environmental claim, and [Technical difficulty—Editor] easy because it goes into a drug approval pathway that's very time-consuming and costly. If we could kind of streamline that and make it go into the feed additive pathway, it would be highly beneficial and would allow these types of products to be registered by CFIA as feeds and not as veterinary drugs.

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

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

Thank you very much, Mr. Perron.

I gave you 15 seconds more to make up for the technical difficulties we had earlier.

Thank you very much, Ms. Stroeve‑Sawa.

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

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I really do thank all of our witnesses for helping to guide our committee through this study.

Mr. MacLeod, I'd like to start with you.

Australia, by June of this year, is going to initiate a national soil strategy action plan that is going to commit the country to a 20-year course. That strategy is going to involve increased soil advocacy and extension services. They're going to try to improve soil monitoring and data sharing. They want to increase investment in soil research and development. They want to improve the communication and collaboration among researchers, landholders, industry, government, first nations peoples and educators. They want to give greater support to land managers to change practices to improve soil health, and they also want to increase focus on education, training and accreditation career paths for soil professionals.

First of all, what is your reaction to what Australia is doing? They have a federal system like ours. They have their national government in Canberra and they have state governments. Do you think that's an example that Canada could do well to follow?

[Cedric MacLeod]

The answer is a resounding “yes”.

As a soil scientist by training and education, I fully support all of those initiatives being undertaken by the government in Australia.

With what we've seen in Canada over the last couple of years with the living labs initiative that's been rolled out by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, and a more clear linkage between the grower community and Ag Canada researchers, and a focus on extension and BMP adoption, I think we've started down that path.

The other piece that I would mention is the new on-farm climate action fund that has been announced. There is strong support for that, where we put dollars in the hands of growers to advance the kinds of practices that Andrea and her farm team have been doing for 35 years, taking that example and supporting others to adopt those BMPs. Part of that program is focused on producer education and outreach to educate on BMPs, so yes, let's keep that going.

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

Okay, thank you very much. I'll turn to the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef.

I was very lucky in summer 2020 to be invited by the cattlemen in British Columbia to tour two ranches in the southern Okanagan that had won sustainability awards for their pioneering rotational grazing methods. It was really amazing. I was touring the actual grasslands that they were managing, and they were showing me the real differences between lands that had been intentionally rotationally grazed upon by their stock, and others that hadn't, and just that very symbiotic relationship that exists between plants and animals. The reason the Prairies were such an amazing place is because you used to have herds of bison, and that relationship is incredibly important.

However, there is a difference in how cattle management practices are in Canada. I'm just wondering, in order to encourage those best practices, what more you would like to see the federal government do. I know you've touched on this, but would you take some time to expand on that a bit more?

[Andrea Stroeve-Sawa]

I love that you got to go and see some grazing. That's wonderful.

I think the research that needs to be funded is the research that helps us better understand land conversion and a balanced research portfolio that supports both industry emissions and carbon sequestration and the value of that.

I think investment in technology transfer is also very important, because in the end that research needs to be delivered to us as producers on the ground, and we need to be able to use that.

I hope that helps and makes sense.

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

On the earlier question I asked to Mr. MacLeod about following Australia's example, do you see value in Canada trying to adopt a national soil strategy?

[Andrea Stroeve-Sawa]

Absolutely, unequivocally, yes, for sure.

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

Thank you for that.

[Andrea Stroeve-Sawa]

I think Australia has been shown to be a leader in measurement of carbon sequestration and soil health. The health of the soil is where the rubber meets the road, so to speak, and if we don't have healthy soils, we can't produce any type of crop then. Those foundations of soil health and the soil health principles are absolutely where we need to go.

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

Thank you.

My final question is to Mr. MacLeod.

What's the public's role in conserving our grassland ecosystems, and what do you think we can recommend to the government to encourage that?

[Cedric MacLeod]

We're seeing additional investments in opportunities to secure those lands through conservation easements or other mechanisms. We're seeing the encouragement of private industry coming in to invest in similar mechanisms for securement.

Some of the programs have been mentioned. Paul had mentioned the Greencover program, and there was some encouragement for the re-establishment and maintenance of those grasslands—all key project ideas.

I think it's public recognition and supporting the awareness of the Canadian public on the role that grasslands play and of the real treasure that farmers and ranchers who steward these lands are protecting. I really don't think there's a general recognition of that. We could—

[The Chair, Liberal, Kody Blois]

Thank you, Mr. MacLeod. Thank you, Mr. MacGregor. We're glad we were able to get that on the record.

I'm going to go back to Mr. Barlow's motion. My understanding is that unless there are any concerns, we can pass that right now.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Foothills, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

It sounds like we have the unanimous support of the committee, and I'm happy to just move ahead with it.