Thank you, Mr. Chairman, vice-chairs and all the members of the committee, for the opportunity to address the importance of fresh water in Canada.
My name is Shelley Peters, and I have had the opportunity to work in the water quality industry for over 30 years.
I'm appearing before the committee today in my role as executive director of the Canadian Water Quality Association, or CWQA. With me today is Jason Jackson, professor, licensed tradesperson and CWQA education consultant. We would like to thank the committee for inviting us, and to thank those members of the committee whom we have spoken with in the past for their time.
The Canadian Water Quality Association is the national voice for the residential, industrial, commercial and institutional water treatment industry throughout Canada. Since our founding in 1956, we have grown to represent over 200 small and medium-sized businesses. We train, certify and advocate for over 1,000 companies in the industry nationwide. These businesses are water quality dealers, retailers, installers, plumbers, small drinking water system providers, wholesale distributors and manufacturers of water quality systems and components, and in total we contribute an estimated $1.2 billion of economic activity in Canada. We believe that safe, healthy water should be available to all Canadians.
Our members are often at the forefront when a Canadian citizen has a question about the water coming out of their taps. They work directly with homeowners, building managers, municipalities, first nation communities and small towns in rural and remote settings to find solutions for local water quality problems. Like for many other industries, it is becoming more challenging to fulfill our customers' needs with respect to water.
Today, new water quality and quantity concerns are becoming prevalent as droughts, floods and wildfires are changing our landscapes and affecting surface and groundwater sources. Another problem facing our industry is that consumer education around water remains low, and recruiting and retaining water quality specialists is a barrier to providing better services to more Canadians.
As our population, economy and communities grow, we put greater and greater pressure on the ecosystems and the sources of water we use for drinking, washing, cooking, recreation and industrial processes such as mining. Fresh water is simultaneously Canada's most important natural resource, and the one we take most for granted.
The water quality industry will play an increasingly important role in preserving freshwater quality over the years and decades ahead. New contaminants like PFOA and PFOS, and emerging contaminants like arsenic, pathogens and even microplastics threaten the health of Canadians. These new realities mean that communities will need new and updated water treatment facilities and processes, and families will need the expertise of water quality professionals to provide treatment options to promote health and quality of life.
Filtration, water softeners, reverse osmosis, ultraviolet and other technologies are important tools to treat water that comes from all sources, including wells, municipal utilities, and lakes and rivers. In some cases, droughts can reduce the quantity of water, and flooding caused by atmospheric rivers or more intense storms can cause water sources to surge, overwhelming municipal treatment facilities and leaving residents with unsafe, untreated water.
These challenges come as no surprise to people residing in communities that have not had access to clean, safe drinking water for years. Where central community-wide water treatment solutions have been ineffective, household point-of-entry and point-of-use alternatives, appropriately installed and serviced, may provide a valuable solution to clean drinking water needs.
Providing more options for household water treatment will be an important consideration moving forward. We have urged the federal government to invest in the creation of a national, accessible water quality map that can provide better information about water contaminants to governments, businesses and mainly consumers. Such a map would also provide water quality specialists who have a depth of experience in providing solutions with more accurate data to suggest solutions for homeowners, residents and business owners to make informed choices about their water treatment needs.
With knowledgeable consumers and water treatment professionals, selecting water treatment technologies can improve water quality, provide more efficient technologies and help to better understand how to mitigate potential issues with quality and quantity by building efficient, sustainable and resilient systems that are affordable to all Canadians.
I appreciate the opportunity to speak about these issues, and we look forward to answering the committee's questions.