Evidence of meeting #10 for Agriculture and Agri-Food in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was fowl.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Michael Coteau
We will suspend for a few minutes. I'll just let people know that we have sent someone down already.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Michael Coteau
Okay. Perfect.
The interpreters are good. I've had a thumbs-up from them.
We will now go to MP Harrison for six minutes.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you, Chair.
Good afternoon. Thank you for being here. It's always a great day when there are people here from the riding of Peterborough, especially those who are advocating so strongly for farmers. I really appreciate your being here. It's nice to see you today.
Chicken Farmers of Canada has invested a lot of time and money into this issue. Could you please tell the committee how much Chicken Farmers of Canada has invested to date into the initial DNA test, and how much you estimate the cost will be to update and maintain the database used to identify spent fowl?
October 27th, 2025 / 3:55 p.m.
Chair, Chicken Farmers of Canada
It's great to be here, and yes, certainly, being from Peterborough too is great.
With that, when we first did the DNA test with Trent University, we spent $250,000. We just made a commitment as a board of directors about two weeks ago to invest another $350,000 to recertify that test. A significant amount of money has been put forward.
I know that maybe it appears that the board of directors is being somewhat presumptuous about where we may end up, but to the board of directors, it was getting out of hand and it needed to be addressed. They certainly were very committed to spending the money.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you for that.
Have you observed any regional disparities in the impact of these imports across Canada?
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
We don't know exactly where those imports end up. You have to assume that most of the imports come to central Canada, Quebec and Ontario, but the impact will be felt all across the country because illegal production reduces our opportunity to grow more chicken. That chicken would be grown in all 10 provinces, so it's a widespread impact all across the country.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you.
To Mr. Kyle, another person from Peterborough, welcome. You're a professor at Trent University, and I love Trent. Thank you so much for being here.
Could you talk a bit about how reliable the test is in distinguishing between broiler meat and spent fowl?
Director, Natural Resources DNA Profiling and Forensic Centre, Trent University
For the ones that we assign.... I can only speak about the tests that we did nearly a decade ago. As to how reliable the tests would be now, we need to reassess what the genetic lines are and how distinct they are.
Going back to that test, it was quite reliable, but it didn't have a fine polish on it. That's the fine polish we're looking to put on it right now, in order to assess its current reliability. I think the fact that we assigned 85% of the samples correctly is strong evidence that it worked well, and the 13 we didn't assign.... I mentioned, just before the interruption, that it's a critical part of any forensic test. When providing forensic evidence in a legal context, you need to have the wherewithal to know when not to make a call. I think that spoke well of our test.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you.
To follow up on that, how long does it typically take to receive the results from the test?
Director, Natural Resources DNA Profiling and Forensic Centre, Trent University
Again, from receiving the sample to giving a result, it depends on relative priorities. This would not be the only thing our centre is doing. If there were a commitment, I would be able to have the staff prioritize this. One could expect that we would provide answers within a few weeks if it were streamlined.
Our current turnaround time for the more generic cases we do with the Ministry of Natural Resources in Ontario, or across the country for that matter.... We promise to have an answer within three months, but investigations are all quite different. There was a streamlined, more industrial process that I can speak about—the waste-water work we did with public health. We were giving next-day answers during the pandemic, so we have the capacity should that arise.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you.
I'll go back to either Mr. Klompmaker or Yves.
How do you envision the DNA test being integrated into the existing inspection enforcement framework?
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
First, it's not up to us to dictate to government agencies how they should do it, because they are the ones responsible for tariff classification and have access to the imported shipments. One thing, for sure, is that we've never asked that the test be administered at the border. You can understand how disruptive it could be to the regular flow of merchandise between countries.
Currently, CFIA inspects meat shipments at receiving plants. When meat is imported into Canada, there are some random inspections for food safety within the plants that receive it. We think that would be the proper place to take samples for DNA, but, clearly, we never asked that it be done at the border. I definitely think combining it with the food safety inspection that already takes place would be the most efficient way.
At the same time, it's up to CBSA and CFIA to decide on the proper risk level and the best way to do the test. They don't ask me about the way to conduct their own operations.
Liberal
Emma Harrison Liberal Peterborough, ON
Thank you.
To either of you, how does this issue affect domestic pricing and market competitiveness for Canadian chicken producers?
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
As I mentioned earlier, we expect it's 45 million kilograms of chicken that we won't produce this year.
First, there's an opportunity in terms of lack of economic activity and lack of production. The illegal products also mean unfair competition for all the Canadian chicken processors who follow the rules. Suddenly, they see that there's a competitor that can outprice them with supply coming from, apparently, spent fowl but which in reality is not spent fowl. It's chicken. It's unfair competition for all the legitimate players throughout the chain.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to all the witnesses for joining us today. I apologize for the technical glitch earlier.
I don't want to be disrespectful to anyone, but I'm a little tired of seeing the DNA test issue come up again. I've been the agriculture critic since 2019. I'm told that work on the tests began in 2014 and was halted in 2018‑19.
So far, a number of questions have been asked. In particular, we talked about the problem's significant impact on your market. For the benefit of those watching at home or elsewhere, could you explain what's going on?
From what I understand, people send their spent hens to the border. Once the spent hens arrive at the border, they are cut in four, packaged, labelled “chicken” and sold as chicken.
Have I understood correctly?
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
It's actually chicken that's put in a box labelled as containing spent hen. It should be noted that, unlike chicken, spent hens are not subject to import controls.
It is chicken illegally imported into Canada. It is declared as spent hens to avoid customs duties and controls.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
This completely distorts the market, which, let's not forget, is subject to a supply management system.
You took matters into your own hands and paid Trent University to develop the test.
People from the industry funded the work at Trent University, and it never received public funds.
Did I understand correctly?
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
That's exactly right. This is a very significant issue for the chicken sector.
The challenge is that the two products are almost identical visually. An inspector can't tell the difference between a chicken breast and a spent hen breast.
As Mr. Lumby mentioned, we were in touch with Maple Leaf right from the get-go. They directed us to the scientists at Trent University to explore solutions.
The problem was so significant that we felt it was worth our while to be proactive and invest in trying to find a solution that works. Our goal was to then present it to the government as a turnkey solution.
Associate Executive Director, Chicken Farmers of Canada
As Mr. Kyle mentioned, the test went through a number of verifications during the development phases. We, the government and Trent University kept in contact.
I can't speak for the government, but my impression, based on what I've seen over the years, is that the government decided instead to focus on internal verification methods, such as accounting auditing and checking all import-related documents.
As we said, and as was also pointed out in the ministers' statement last March, over $300 million was claimed in duties, interest and penalties related to fraudulent and illegal imports.
They did further verification. It was a valiant effort. However, we realize 10 years later that despite their efforts, despite the fact that they put spent fowl on the list of verification priorities three times in a row and therefore did three rounds of verification, the problem has not gone away.
I think it's time to move on and do something bigger.
Bloc
Yves Perron Bloc Berthier—Maskinongé, QC
Don't you think the work on the test should be completed?
I don't understand why this work has been scrapped in a country that claims to attach critical importance to research, development and innovation.
A scientific method should be used to solve the problem. It's not about inspecting every load, but rather taking samples during random inspections, as you said. In fact, we are already doing that. It would be relatively easy to do that.
Instead, we find ourselves 10 or 12 years later having to deal with the same problem. This is similar to what is happening at the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, or PMRA, regarding the time frame for registration. I think it's taking too long. In addition, work on the test has been scrapped. This is a serious issue.
Mr. Kyle, you mentioned earlier that you had an 85% success rate when the work was scrapped. You say that the test should be validated again and that you can do that in a few weeks for generic cases. You're saying that you can resolve all this in three months, as I understand it.
Did I understand correctly?
Can you tell me how much that would cost?
Director, Natural Resources DNA Profiling and Forensic Centre, Trent University
No, I was talking about the time it takes to get results. The time it takes to get the results of the analysis of a sample depends on the resources we have. If we don't have the resources, it will take a little more time to analyze the samples and provide an answer, but as for the costs—