Mr. Chair and members of the committee, I would like to thank you for inviting us to be here today.
I am Pierre Petelle, and I am the vice-president of Chemistry at CropLife Canada.
On behalf of the association's member companies, I am pleased to provide these remarks on the review of the Pest Control Products Act. I will also be pleased to answer all of your questions following my presentation.
CropLife Canada is the trade association that represents the manufacturers, developers and distributors of plant science technologies, including pest control products and plant biotechnology, for use in agriculture, urban and public health settings.
We strive to ensure that the benefits of plant science innovations can be enjoyed by both farmers and consumers. CropLife Canada promotes sustainable agricultural practices, and we are committed to protecting human health and the environment.
Our members are continuously innovating to provide the most effective and the safest tools for food production, public health protection, utility rights-of-way, and green spaces. Canadian agriculture generates more than $100 billion annually in economic activity. Crop protection products and plant biotechnology improve crop quality and increase yields, which lead to over $7.9 billion in additional value for farmers of field, vegetable, and fruit crops. It also contributes off-farm value worth over $6.4 billion in areas such as processing, shipping, and manufacturing.
Without pesticides and plant biotechnology tools, we could lose up to 40% of our crops in Canada to weeds, insects, and diseases. On average, Canadian families save over 58% on their weekly grocery bills thanks to those plant science innovations, but these products cannot exist without a modern, predictable, and timely science-based regulatory system.
The current version of the Pest Control Products Act, brought into force in 2006, has unprecedented protections and transparency provisions for Canadians. Despite the significant changes that the new act meant, CropLife Canada and its member companies supported these measures when they were introduced, as a means of increasing the confidence of Canadians in their science-based regulatory system. We were and we remain confident in the science that supports our products, so we welcomed the additional safety provisions and the unprecedented openness of this legislation.
We believe that, on balance, the act is still working well today, and we do not support major revisions to it. The primary objective of the act is to prevent unacceptable risks to people and the environment and to measure those risks in a predictable, timely, and science-based fashion. This is an objective that we as an industry share, and we believe that the act is well positioned to continue to meet those goals.
Canadian farmers compete on a global level. They face ongoing challenges from weeds, insects, and diseases and must have timely access to the most modern pest control products in the world. They need access to those tools in order to remain competitive and to ensure our food supply remains abundant, affordable, and safe.
We should not take this for granted. Some jurisdictions have allowed their regulatory system to become driven by ideology and special interest groups, rather than relying on the robust, risk-based scientific assessment that is prescribed in our Pest Control Products Act. The results of non-science-based decision-making are numerous: declining food production, diminished trade, higher food prices for consumers, and a lack of consumer confidence in the regulatory system.
Another objective of the act is to encourage public awareness in relation to pesticides. We feel that this has been an area that the government can and should improve upon. Canada has one of the most highly respected regulatory systems around the world. It balances the need for farmers to have timely access to new technologies while protecting the health and safety of Canadians and the environment. This is something that we as a country should be proud of; however, in the face of ongoing activist attacks on the safety of pesticides in Canada, the regulator remains relatively silent.
We would encourage the government to stand up for the regulatory system and help educate Canadians about the safety of the products farmers are using to produce their food. We're concerned about the erosion in public confidence that is being orchestrated by some special interest groups. Rather than improving public confidence with this modern piece of legislation, we have seen these groups openly criticizing Health Canada and second-guessing the rigorous scientific assessments, sometimes without any scientific evidence. Indeed, Mr. Chair, they are conducting these campaigns without using the very provisions they lobbied for in the act, provisions that allow them to have new scientific information evaluated.
Some groups are also attempting to use the transparency provisions of the act to bog down the PMRA and reduce their ability to deliver the safe and effective tools that farmers and others need. While transparency is vital, and we as an industry support that, the PMRA must have the ability to do its job as a science-based regulator.
There are some who will recommend to this committee the greater use of precaution or the use of the precautionary principle in Canada when regulating pesticides. Most experts, however, would argue that our system is highly precautionary, from the requirement for a full pre-market assessment to the post-registration controls that are in place. In fact, the precautionary principle is enshrined in the current act in section 20.
Scientists around the world are raising red flags about the misuse of this precautionary principle. It is being used by some as an excuse to block all progress and innovation. In fact, if we were to apply some groups' interpretation of precaution, there would be no tools available to growers. We must not allow this distorted view to get a foothold in Canada. Canada is a major food exporter, and this agricultural trade is critical to Canada's economic prosperity. No other sector is as keenly interested in, or as heavily impacted by, trade rules as agriculture is.
Regulatory harmonization, including joint reviews, is critical for agriculture. Harmonized maximum residue limits, or MRLs, are essential to ensuring the smooth flow of trade across borders. There is no point in bringing the latest technologies to farmers if they can't use them for fear of trade disruptions when they export their commodities. We need harmonized mechanisms to establish MRLs with our trading partners.
We strongly support the leadership role that the PMRA has played at the international level. The regulatory harmonization and cooperation for pesticide regulations is the envy of other sectors. This has allowed Canada to play a significant role in joint reviews and in work sharing, and has brought new technologies to Canadian farmers at the same time as their global competitors in much bigger markets.
We support the efforts of the Government of Canada to expand and safeguard trade globally, and we appreciate the efforts being made through initiatives such as the red tape reduction strategy and the U.S.-Canada Regulatory Cooperation Council both to ease the regulatory burden on farmers and our industry and to facilitate trade. These initiatives have a very positive impact on Canada's reputation globally as a place to invest and create jobs.
In conclusion, Mr. Chair, CropLife Canada and its member companies believe the act in its current form is largely meeting our needs. In general, any changes and improvements we might like to see can be achieved through regulation and policy rather than through legislative change.
We thank you and the committee again for inviting us, and we welcome any questions you may have.