Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the members of the committee.
My name is John Cranfield. I'm here today representing the Deans Council of Agriculture, Food and Veterinary Medicine. The deans council is composed of deans from 13 faculties at 11 universities across Canada. Our faculties have been teaching and researching agriculture and agri-food for over 125 years. We've worked together as a pan-Canadian non-profit association since 1991. The deans council engages in dialogue with industry and government to find solutions to national and global issues in agriculture, food, health and the environment.
Today, I would like to bring a different lens on business risk management, namely the role of science and research in driving innovation and reducing business risk. BRM is usually viewed from the perspective of an immediate crisis: for example, a crop failure driven by drought, a livestock population decimated by an invasive disease or a sudden and unexpected market-based shock. These events matter deeply to producers, and effective short-term BRM supports are essential.
Over the longer term, innovation is one of the most powerful risk management tools available to Canadian agriculture. Productivity improvements reduce per unit costs for producers. Early disease detection systems prevent catastrophic losses. Better decision tools help producers manage weather variability, input use and environmental performance. Collectively, these advances strengthen farm profitability, competitiveness and resilience, which are key outcomes of any effective BRM system.
The deans council has worked with industry to establish an industry-academia partnership addressing agri-food research, innovation, skills and education. We have conducted and supported studies on the research ecosystem, on skills and training and, more recently, on the agriculture and agri-food innovation continuum.
The deans council recently launched the driving digital agriculture initiative, which aims to create a national network connecting research-intensive faculties of agriculture, food and veterinary medicine across 11 universities. This network will strengthen collaboration among universities and across disciplines, including engineering, health and environmental sciences. It will also strengthen ties with agricultural colleges that play an important role in training. Our objective is simple: to better connect data, people and expertise, so research insights move more quickly and reliably into real-world decisions that drive innovation.
The initiative will also link and align existing digital agriculture efforts, including on-farm data and knowledge translation and extension activities, such as the smart farm network. So far, we have identified partners, including the P.E.I. Federation of Agriculture, the Canadian Agri-Food Automation and Intelligence Network, Farm Credit Canada and the Enterprise Machine Intelligence and Learning Initiative, all of whom are helping to define the key elements of a globally competitive digital agriculture strategy. The Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute has also been an essential partner in helping to shape that broader agri-food innovation strategy.
By building a federated, national network that drives digital agriculture and innovation, we strengthen business risk management in three important ways. First, it reduces production risks by enabling earlier detection of threats and more precise management responses before losses cascade. Second, it reduces financial and market risk by driving innovations that will improve productivity, quality and traceability, all of which support competitiveness and value-added growth. Third, it reduces systematic risk by ensuring that Canada's agricultural data and resulting economic value remain in Canada, rather than flowing to fragmented or foreign platforms.
Driving digital agriculture is about strengthening Canada's long-term resilience by ensuring that research investments translate into practical and producer-ready tools that manage risk, improve performance and sustain confidence in Canadian agriculture.
In closing, the deans council encourages the committee to view innovation and knowledge mobilization as foundational components of business risk management. Well-designed BRM programs help producers recover from shocks, but innovation-enabled systems help prevent those shocks from becoming crises in the first place.
Thank you for your time. I look forward to your questions.