Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's a pleasure to be here today.
Those of us who live on Prince Edward Island think we live on one of the world's great islands, and a lot of people who visit us each year think so as well, and they come for the beauty of the landscape as well as the beaches. But our landscape is changing drastically here, and that's a real concern for those of us who are involved in agriculture on Prince Edward Island.
The foundation of this presentation to the parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance lies in the fact that Canada’s maritime provinces have lost more of their livestock infrastructure and resource base and have suffered a greater economic devastation in these two than any other region in this country. Coupled with the fact that agriculture, particularly in P.E.I., plays a higher percentage role in the provincial GDP than it does in any province in Canada and has one of the highest dependencies on inter-commodity relationships, this event has devastating implications to the economic, social, and rural fabric of the region.
There are three issues we want to discuss today, and those are Atlantic livestock and grains, research, and energy.
Recently the federal government announced a buy-out program for the hog industry in Canada. As of now, P.E.I. has lost over 50% of its hog herd and, with this national initiative, stands to lose the rest of its breeding stock as the federal program is rolled out. The Atlantic region does not contribute to the over-supply of red meat in Canada, because as of now we probably produce only of about 10% of what we actually consume. Atlantic Canada cannot afford to allow its red meat or any other food source to centralize in other geographical regions of the country. It has already lost its self-sufficiency in many respects, but the repercussions of total dependence on imports are far-reaching in an environment of increasing vulnerability in the world market.
Both feed grains and livestock are well positioned to capitalize on the opportunity for regional cooperation to reduce input costs, to operate greener, and to reduce the carbon footprint through the commercial model of “buy local”. We will require federal assistance through a recognition of the need for a regional funding program. Work is already under way to identify and document the fundamentals of what this project would look like, and though financial figures as yet are not finalized, the potential components and the related costs of this package are as indicated below.
We will require single-desk buying and selling of maritime-grown feed grains utilized in maritime-grown hogs and cattle. Pricing will provide both a sustainable return for grain growers and a viable price pool for feed stocks for maritime hog and cattle producers that allow them to be competitive in their cost of production with counterparts in geographic trading regions. Because there is no policy, maritime grains are often sold out of the region while feed grains are at the same time being trucked into the region.
Mike is going to talk to the research and energy.