Industry Committee on Oct. 5th, 2016

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Thank you to our witnesses for being here today.

I've had an opportunity as a farmer and someone involved in the industry to see a lot of innovative ideas that are taking place. I had the opportunity yesterday to sit in with the Senate agriculture committee when they were speaking about honey imports and some of the issues that have happened there, primarily at the border. Those are CBSA issues as well as CFIA. The concern is with adulterated honey coming in from other countries. Again, that puts pressure on the products we have.

There are some ideas about some new testing procedures that perhaps we could do. Otherwise, we end up sending samples to Germany to have them tested for the adulteration. If we could do some of that closer to home, it would be certainly much better.

The other thing I've been engaged with the Senate agriculture committee, SCAF, on is the interprovincial barriers especially with meat production. That has more to do with the border issues we have across this country versus border issues with other countries. I think that's where we should also be focusing some of our thoughts.

Another point I want to make, before I specifically ask you a question on this, has to do with investments and the dollars we put in. I had the opportunity a couple of weeks ago to be with the science minister in Germany. When you take a look at the actual investments that our governments have been putting in over the last number of years, it is equivalent to what you would see going into German scientific research.

The point is that we are not getting the buy-in from business. They were saying that there are three specific reasons. Geography is one of them. It takes us six hours to fly from one end of our country to the other. That's part of it. Another one is a jurisdictional issue as far as provinces are concerned. The third is market access. They are the place that people want to go because they are one of the bigger centres. When we look at this, people really don't want to spend the money here. They'd sooner spend it in the United States.

I'm curious if, in your discussions, you found some ways to mitigate some of the issues I've just presented.

[Andrea Johnston]

There's a long list of issues.

Certainly in terms of the internal barriers, internal trade is a key issue, and for any processing company, having consistent rules and regulations across the provinces is critically important. We see that being critically important in terms of attracting foreign investment into Canada. Understanding the rules of the game between each province and having some kind of level playing field as we move products across the country is important.

One of the interesting issues that you raised is in terms of technology and testing. If you were at SCAF or other...you would hear a bit about spent fowl and the issues that the sector is facing there. We're working closely with Trent University in developing DNA testing. There are opportunities to make made-in-Canada solutions for some of these border control issues. That's a very exciting area.

The last comment you had, was it on R and D investments and the challenges?

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

Yes.

[Andrea Johnston]

I think the point is correct. There are a limited amount of R and D funds in the world, particularly in Canada. The challenge for Canadian businesses is to attract those funds, show that they can be used for commercialization purposes and better spinoff.

It is like anything in market access issues. It's a globally competitive area in terms of attracting R and D investment funds.

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer—Mountain View, AB]

One of the other issues, of course, as we try to sell products to other countries.... Fortunately, when China was looking at reducing dockage on canola from 2% to 0.5%, that was finally dealt with. There was the recognition of how it was simply being set up as a trade barrier and nothing else. These are important things for our governments when we are discussing issues with other countries, to make sure we're aware of the reasons that certain countries make decisions.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Mr. Masse, you have five minutes.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

Ms. Lamondin, I find some of the things that have changed on the Canada-U.S. border interesting. Also what interests me is the U.S.-Mexico border, given Mexico's expansion of their overall GDP and also their imports and exports going across our nations. Are they treated exactly the same as Canada and the United States when it comes to food inspection between the United States and Mexico?

[Lyzette Lamondin]

That's a very good question.

It's not exactly the same as Canada and the U.S., because we've done much more work in looking at each other's systems for equivalence, whether it's meat or with the U.S. FDA. With the U.S., we have a high level of confidence, probably more than any other country in the world. We've looked at it so systematically, the laws, the inspections, the resources, and whatnot.

Mexico does send a lot of product to Canada, and we send a lot of product to Mexico, so we do have a strong relationship with them. We just signed a protocol last week for full expansion with meat to Mexico. There had been limitations on it, but now it's a full expansion from there. We routinely go down and look at their systems, for example, for fish, shellfish, and elements like that. They also come to Canada. We have a strong relationship in trade there. I would say they fall in the category more of countries other than the U.S., because they are definitely different.

Our primary trading partner is the United States. That's where most of the food coming into Canada comes from, and that's where most of our food exports go. Our systems are very equivalent on almost every level.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you for that answer. With that, maybe we could have an update regarding the current situation. I know there was a change on the border for food inspection. I raised some concerns about this. For the trucks that were coming into Canada that were identified for food inspection, there was a fax and the destination time was tracked for the truck to get to the food inspection site. We have two sites in Windsor. When there was no fax, some trucks went missing and went to inspection sites along the 400 highway up to Toronto even. Then the trucks would disappear. We saw that some of the meats went right into the inspection stations in Windsor. It went public that for some of the meats and fish that required extensive inspection included canned goods, and some had maggots in them and stuff like that. The concern was what was happening in the time between the truck getting to the border and getting to the inspection site, and what happened to the truck in the meantime.

Can you explain what that process is right now and whether that's been...? If you don't know, then maybe we can get a written response later. I know it's highly technical, but it's important for food safety.

[Lyzette Lamondin]

I can't speak to that situation, as I'm not aware of it. I do know there are some stringent rules particularly about meat having to be inspected at the border and then going to registered facilities for follow-up and reinspection. If it doesn't happen, then I would think that would be a contravention of the regulations, and that would be in a whole other area. Other food coming into Canada doesn't have the same level of requirements. Meat is the most strictly regulated of all the sectors, but it has to be routinely checked at the border. They have to meet requirements. The requirements are different. One of the reasons we want to change the regulations is that they are so radically different from some other commodities. Canned products, for example, could be fish, which is well regulated, to a number of processed products that only have to be safe when sold. So we have a patchwork there.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Do we know what percentage comes into Canada from trucks versus out of containers in ports? Is that something where we would have an idea about food products and breakdowns?

[Lyzette Lamondin]

I don't think that's the type of information that the CFIA would track. We mostly track non-compliances.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Maybe I can ask our researchers, because I know we have one thing to follow up on. I would be interested in that because that's important, and I know containers go through a lot less of an inspection process. Are you just going to track the non-compliance?

[Lyzette Lamondin]

We do samples at the border of certain products. The determination of what product we sample and where it's coming from is based on historical figures of risk, and we're moving more and more towards that. As we find more non-compliances, then we target that product, and as we find fewer, then we move things over.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Yes.

[Lyzette Lamondin]

It does change from year to year for what we do. I don't think the method of transport has any bearing. I think it's the food and where that food is coming from.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you.

Mr. Baylis, you have five minutes.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

The major part of our study is about manufacturing productivity. We're looking for ways to help our manufacturers be more productive. In other industries, such as transportation, medical devices, health care, the regulator plays an important role in approving products that are developed here before they have access to market.

In that light, can you speak to the role that you play in helping our food manufacturers get access to market?

[Lyzette Lamondin]

Health Canada, which is not us, plays an important role in certain food products and allowing them in certain processes that are allowed onto the market.

For our part, the CFIA doesn't do pre-approvals of food products or technologies, per se. What we do rely on are the international standards, and we're moving more to those standards in terms of what sorts of controls companies put in place. We're also moving more and more at looking to companies under our new proposed regulations—again, this is an internationally based way of doing it—leaving it to the companies to be more innovative and not stifle them. If they come up with new technologies or new methods of doing something, they can use these products if they've been appropriately scientifically validated.

In the past we have, and still have, examples of that in our regulations until the new regulations come in. We did approve certain things before they could do it and we put it in our manual. An example is the material that a dairy plant would have to be made from. It had to be stainless steel. That was limiting in terms of innovation. We would routinely get requests saying another country is able to use other material that has been demonstrated to be just as safe, but in Canada they couldn't.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

We weren't able to keep up with technology. What are we doing about that now?

[Lyzette Lamondin]

That's where the new regulations come into play. The new regulations take out all that prescriptiveness of saying you must use this process, you must use this material, and you must do it in this way. It say, you have to address these risks. You have to do your hazard analysis. You have to find out what the critical control points are and put in place the preventive controls. We're going to give you some idea of already validated methods, like stainless steel, but if you can come up with a newer, innovative process and prove to us that it's safe, you'll be able to use it.

That's really where it is.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

You've made that change, to take into account the rate of change.

[Lyzette Lamondin]

We're hoping to make that change.

[Frank Baylis, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

It has not been made.