Thank you, Ms. Gue. We'll have to wrap it up there. That's the end of your six minutes.
Colleagues, I will be doing my line of questioning here from the chair.
Ms. Lamothe Boudreau, I'd like to start with you.
I really appreciate the testimony you have offered our committee from your expertise in breeding queens. One thing has struck me through these hearings. I think that we all know that, in farming as in nature, there is an evolutionary arms race that is going on. When pests overwhelm their hosts, some hosts will develop a trait, or farmers will seek to breed in a beneficial trait that allows it to survive certain climatic conditions or various pests.
I've just been curious, because I know we have one main species of honeybee, and there are a lot of subvariants. Given your expertise, when it comes to things like the varroa mite and the viruses that mite contains and other diseases that affect hives, is there any promise on the horizon from increased research and funding for bee breeding programs that it might be possible to select traits that allow bees to better withstand that?
I've been quite concerned from the testimony that we've heard about the development of certain species of varroa that are now resistant to conventional treatments. Again, this is part of the evolutionary arms race. They are going to develop traits that allow them to survive what we are using to treat them.
Could you offer some of your experience and expertise about the kinds of recommendations you'd like to see in this report? What promise is there in the future for bee breeding and selecting traits that may help us deal with some of these issues?