Environment Committee on May 1st, 2012

[Ron Bonnett]

Please explain what you mean by working landscape.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

The working landscape, the working agricultural landscape, and by extension the working forestry landscape, because Canada has a lot of landscapes that are essentially pristine, so there's that zone of intense use. Should that be a priority for the NCP?

[Ron Bonnett]

Yes, definitely.

I mentioned that the agricultural land is actually where that interface takes place between urban communities and the rural landscape. That's where a lot of the concern around environmental issues takes place, because as you mentioned, the pristine landscape is basically the way it's been for close to a thousand years.

I think that concentrating on some of the agricultural landscape would get you a lot more bang for your buck on improving any conservation objective.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Are farmers and ranchers in a very strong mood these days to participate in programs that may result from the national conservation plan?

[Ron Bonnett]

There would be a certain amount of “show me the money”. I think what we're finding is that farmers are starting to see some of the benefits--as I said, the win-win situations. But often when you're moving ahead with something new or innovative, it does take some seed money to get that up and going.

The other thing I think you have to be conscious of is that if there were a real conscious effort on moving ahead with stewardship initiatives, as opposed to a regulatory framework, I think it would be fair to say that farmers are the type of people that when you come at them with a regulation, they actually have a little bit of this head-to-head type of reaction.

If you're looking at how we can make a win out of this, how is it good for the environment, how is it good for me and my farm, I think you'll find farmers will be stepping up.

Doug mentioned the environmental farm plan program. Right now, in the province of Ontario, when that money is announced every year, about six hours later it's all allocated for the full year. There's that much pent-up demand. So farmers are actually really stepping forward to do it, providing the program to make it work.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Chorney, give us some quick thoughts on how a national incentive-based ecological goods and services program might work for Canada.

[Doug Chorney]

I think you would have to look at all the highest-risk environmental areas initially. You would have to look at where you can make the biggest impact and use incentives for the people managing the landscape in those sensitive areas to adopt practices to protect them.

In the case of wetland restoration and water storage, there are some challenges. In fact, I have been challenged by some farmers who have heard me on the radio talk about wetland restoration, and they're saying, “Your organization's against drainage.” I'm not against drainage. I think drainage is an essential tool for producers. But there are farmers who don't feel they should have to hold water for anybody. The challenge for the producers is the economic signals they're getting in regard to seeding and cropping every arable acre that's in their control, if possible.

If we were to give them different economic signals through an ALUS program that gave them compensation or just removed the property taxes from that land they're putting into conservation as a simple incentive, that would cost very little and it would be a good start.

I think we could take a staged approach. Obviously, at times like this our public treasuries are provincially and federally challenged to take on new initiatives. Maybe we need to take a staged approach and not move into this all in one year. Through that slow, staged process people will learn how they can be part of this.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Do you think an incentive-based ecological goods and services program, if implemented properly, could actually replace the need for expensive regulations?

[Doug Chorney]

It would depend on what context. Certainly you're going to always be in a situation with industry where you need to regulate emissions and things like that, and you can never depend on incentives completely.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Right.

[Doug Chorney]

I think we have to look at the big public interest that's at stake in regard to irresponsible practices.

I think you need a combination. There has to be a regulatory component to the incentive component, I think, to be truly in the public's best interests.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

If we did have an incentive-based ecological goods and services program, would you have a rough idea of what pricing might be used? How could the ecological goods and services be priced?

[Doug Chorney]

No. I have the estimate of $20 million for Manitoba, but I don't have a national number.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Okay. But how about per farm, on a per acre basis?

Go ahead, Ron.

[Ron Bonnett]

That would actually depend on the types of priorities—if it's water issues, if it's wildlife habitat. Just to give you an example, I know that there was some legislation being proposed in Ontario about protecting certain land-based birds, and the production cost to farmers was going to be fairly high on that.

So again, it could vary, depending on the farms. I think this is why I'd go back to really setting what the priorities are to start with, in order to get a handle on what the costs would be. Set the priorities and identify what some of the options might be for solutions, and then I think you could get into some of the costs.

Just to comment on your question on regulation, though, I think we'd likely understand that regulation may be necessary, but it's the last-ditch approach. Stewardship incentives should be number one in trying to get that cooperation, because that is where you get a lot more bang for the buck.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Yes, and getting a bang for a buck is what we're all about these days.

Mr. Chorney, I think you talked about how we can't silo conservation into one department and how there has to be a multi-departmental look at this.

Mr. Bonnett, you talked about the changes we're making to the Fisheries Act. It sounds to me like you're fairly supportive of those changes.

By and large, is the agricultural community supportive of those changes we're making?

[Ron Bonnett]

Yes, the changes to the Fisheries Act have a large amount of support.

I actually received a number of phone calls from farmers concerned about the complicated process for just getting drain maintenance approved in the past, because of the multi-layers. You'd have the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, sometimes the Ministry of Natural Resources in Ontario or the Ministry of Environment, plus local conservation authorities.

This way, you can get it streamlined down to real quick decision-making.

[The Chair, Conservative, Mark Warawa]

Your time has expired. Thank you so much.

Ms. Duncan, you have seven minutes.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank our guests. It has been really interesting, and I thank you for your time and effort.

I'm going to get a little more specific. Should the government be considering renewable energy projects as part of a conservation plan, Mr. Bonnett?

[Ron Bonnett]

I think renewable energy is a piece of it. One of the things that I think we're starting to see is that technology is changing very quickly. If I take a look on-farm at the types of projects that are going on now.... On our own farm we've put some solar panels in place, but a lot of farms are putting methane digesters in place now.

If there are incentives and encouragement to enter into those types of things, I think it does two things. It creates some of those sources of renewable energy and reduces some of the dependence on fossil fuels, and it also creates another income stream for farms.

But I think what we're seeing happening now is that technology is changing fairly rapidly, so the costs of those systems are coming down and the efficiency is going up. Just to give you an example, even on the solar panels, the price of those units dropped 30% in the last two years, just because the technology started expanding. A number of things like that I think could be part of a national conservation plan.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Chorney, can you give us very specific recommendations that you would like to see in our report? What would you like to recommend to the committee about renewable energy and what support might you like? Because there is a benefit. There's a benefit to the atmosphere and there's a benefit to the bottom line.

[Doug Chorney]

We've a really good example of that in Manitoba with IISD, the International Institute for Sustainable Development. They've done a cattail project, where they've used cattails to extract nutrients from the Netley-Libau Marsh. They've actually proven that this technology works. You harvest the nutrients and use the cattails as a source of bio-energy, and then the ash can be reused later on as fertilizer. Although we consider the nitrification risks to Lake Winnipeg to be a tremendous liability for our environment, this could be our next big asset for the future if we can harvest these nutrients and somehow market them as a fertilizer. Fertilizer is a big variable cost for producers. If these nutrients are all tied up in sediment in the lake, any work that can be done on technology to extract those nutrients would be very useful.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chorney.

Mr. Bonnett, what would be the specific recommendation? You can have two or three minutes.

[Ron Bonnett]

I just jotted down two or three things.

First is research. I think, definitely, on the whole energy side, there's going to be an ongoing need for research and innovation.

The next thing is looking at tax policy to encourage private investment. I have another story I could tell you about Revenue Canada. I'll just leave that for now. That's a whole different story.

The other thing that enters into it is long-term contracts. If you can get into long-term contracts for selling power, then all of a sudden you can start costing that capital asset out over a long period of time.

Those are three things that just jump to mind right away quickly.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

I appreciate that.

That takes me right into my next question. I think research and monitoring should be the significant keys to the conservation plan going forward. Is there any specific agricultural research you would like to see included?