Agriculture Committee on Nov. 3rd, 2025

[Sylvain Charlebois]

We could look at corporate taxation, but based on what we've evaluated with MNP in looking at G20 countries, Canada is actually already competitive. The challenge, of course, is that we are in a vast country, so we have to make our country immensely attractive to attract more investments. That's really the biggest problem we have, as far I'm concerned, when it comes to innovation—creating opportunity for Canadians and attracting more competition to reduce prices.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Let me put some of your own words right back at you about the valley of death and the distance between proof of concept and commercialization. In your opening comments, you talked about how public sector investment is seemingly not getting the job done. Private sector R and D investment has dropped off 37% since 2023. Why?

[Sylvain Charlebois]

It's because we can't scale up businesses.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Why?

[Sylvain Charlebois]

I was at Purdue University just a month ago teaching a class to entrepreneurs. In the room, you had several companies looking at investing. They know that they can actually launch and scale up their businesses very rapidly, which very much attracts VCs. In Canada we're very good at starting businesses. We're not very good at keeping them.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

I'll switch to you, Mr. Lemaire, on the plastics registry and the interplay or interchange between federal and provincial. It's a challenge in a whole bunch of situations.

What hasn't been coming into the testimony here with respect to single-use plastics, as provinces look at that, is the idea of recycling. Is there a linkage there? Is one of the problems that it's provincially regulated in terms of the recycling aspect with plastics? How do we address that?

[Ron Lemaire]

Thank you, Mr. Epp.

On the concept of recycling, we have a systems issue with plastics. This is the underlying challenge across the country. The systems issue is that we want to create a circular economy, but we don't have the infrastructure and the modelling in play to do so, to actually create enough resin and move forward.

When the tariffs were put on China by the U.S. around some of their recycled content, all of a sudden there was a massive move to try to buy as much recycled content as possible for plastic manufacturers, because it was going to be extremely expensive to move forward. It's already a challenge with virgin resin.

We need to look at a system in Canada that looks at how we create our own internalized model and drives business back to the investment. How do we get the capital and the private equity models in place and move forward?

Atlantic Canada's Sustane is an operation that takes all sorts of plastics. They put that into their operation and create new material that can then be sold. They're actually selling it overseas. It's a $70-million start-up and they're having a challenge to get there. That's a good operational opportunity.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you.

I want to get one other thought in. Many of the challenges, in this study particularly, we've dealt with for 10 years. It's a culture change that we're looking for, specifically in the two agencies we're focusing on: the CFIA and the PMRA. What is needed? I think of the four Rs: right place, right time, right amount and right regulations. Our regulations are good, but we're not fast enough in adopting them.

We're not fast enough. What is needed? I'll start with you, Mr. Charlebois.

[Sylvain Charlebois]

I think it boils down to understanding execution and the value of execution. Industry is very good at innovating, but often is held back by regulations.

Whenever we actually decide to empower industry with new technologies, we're not very good at communicating that to the public, and then you hear that from them, as parliamentarians. You're the ones who then will just step back and be more prudent about what you're trying to achieve, which makes things even more complicated.

This is really the trick here. It's to actually understand in lockstep how we can have industry and regulators work together and communicate that to the public in real time.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you.

I know Mr. Chair is going to cut me off, so—

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

I gave some extra seconds for the answer.

Thank you.

I'll go to MP Harrison for five minutes.

[Emma Harrison, Liberal, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Countries such as Australia, the Netherlands and Singapore have implemented agile regulatory frameworks to support agritech innovation. What lessons can Canada learn from international models of regulatory reform in the agri-food sector?

This is for Mr. Buy.

[Serge Buy]

Thank you.

Absolutely. You're entirely right. We don't need to recreate the wheel. There are a lot of countries that have done stellar jobs in looking at their regulatory systems. Australia is one. New Zealand is another one.

Some European countries have done a great job, but at the same time, if you go to Europe and ask them about their regulatory systems, some of them will tell you that, as an example, it takes six permits to cut a tree on your property. That's for farms. They don't want to get to there.... For the food research industry, it's a similar thing. They see themselves as overburdened.

We are in a different spot. I do believe that we can certainly look at other countries and look at other models. Australia is a great model on the regulatory side, especially with its own structure, which mirrors Canada's.

I also think that we need to go to a risk-based approach on some of those regulations. You know, it's interesting. We had a conference a few months ago where an American presenter was talking. Someone made a comment about their regulatory system compared to ours. The individual said, “You know, in the U.S., we have less regulation, but we also have much more accountability from the judicial system, which makes innovators and businesses a little more wary about doing the wrong thing.” The presenter said, “In the end, we're fairly safe.”

It's the same way in Canada. It's not a bad idea to look at other models and at the way things are done in other countries. I fully support that. The only thing I don't support is wasting a lot of time on more studies. Every year, we go back to the same questions, with the same parliamentary committee meetings asking the same questions and doing great reports with great recommendations about this.

It's time to act. That comes with leadership. You are in leadership. Let's show leadership and direct the fantastic people who work in those agencies to do better faster.

[Emma Harrison, Liberal, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you so much for your answer.

Are there any specific international practices that you'd like to see enacted in Canada?

[Serge Buy]

That's a broad question. There are a number of them. We can probably provide a number of them to the committee at a later stage. I would be a little bit remiss to go through a number of them right now.

[Emma Harrison, Liberal, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Lemaire, I'll ask you the same kind of question. Are there any examples in the international community that you would like to bring forward and discuss?

[Ron Lemaire]

Yes. I'm happy to provide a list of options. To the point that was just made by my colleague, we can see a lot of opportunities, especially out of Australia. We have to look at like parliamentary systems. Going back to the point on the judicial system in different jurisdictions, that is a check and balance.

When we look at an example from here in Canada, we had a tool that was presented, a private member's bill, by the former chair of this committee. Bill C-359 provided the regulatory direction for efficiencies in registration and alignment. We don't have to go outside the country. We had the mechanism ready to go. It just has to be put in play.

[Emma Harrison, Liberal, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you.

I'll share my last minute with Ms. Chatel.

[Sophie Chatel, Liberal, Pontiac—Kitigan Zibi, QC]

Thank you.

You mentioned some very important solutions, Mr. Buy. For example, you suggested setting up a Canada-wide council, somewhat like what is being done to facilitate harmonization between Canada and the United States. The committee would very much like you to send these solutions to us in writing. We're really looking for solutions that would work and that would change the structure a bit.

Mr. Buy, you seemed to be saying earlier that even if we didn't set up new institutions or a new bureaucracy, it would still be important to establish a regulatory council. Some witnesses mentioned that the agile regulations table, which we have here, could be formalized.

Do you have an opinion on that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

We have to stop there. Sorry.

[Sophie Chatel, Liberal, Pontiac—Kitigan Zibi, QC]

If it could be sent to us in writing, that would be great.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Coteau]

Let's go to Mr. Perron for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The committee has heard from a number of witnesses who talked about looking at what is being done elsewhere. It's coming up again in the questions. We all agree on increasing efficiency. For example, if we're testing a new molecule, why not partner with a trusted neighbour? The partner would do one type of study, we would do another, then we could combine our data. That would speed things up. The problem here is the climate. Let's say that some tests are done in the southern United States and others in Saskatchewan. The climate isn't the same, the soil type isn't the same, so the reactions can differ. There will be other types of testing to do, but we could still make improvements.

How do we go about establishing such partnerships without having to give up our independent decision-making power and without putting the health and safety of our people and producers at risk? That's also important.

I'd like to hear from all three witnesses on this issue, starting with Mr. Charlebois.

[Sylvain Charlebois]

It kind of comes down to science, ultimately, because knowledge sharing is an integral part of science. I travel for my job. My colleagues travel a lot as well. We are already working with other partners around the world. We have been doing so for a while now.

When products eventually come to market, we have to make sure that they are compatible with our environment, our market and so on, but it shouldn't take a year. For example, Health Canada could work with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or FDA. In fact, I think they already work with the FDA, but they could work even more closely together. That would be a welcome development. It must be said that there are a lot of products. Basically, there are a number of businesses that never see the light of day because all this takes too long.

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

What do you think, Mr. Lemaire?