Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and members of the committee.
I will be speaking English.
On behalf of Medicago, I would like to thank you for inviting us to present at this hearing.
Medicago is a Canadian biopharmaceutical company with a mission to improve health outcomes of people by using our innovative plant-based protein expression technologies for rapid response to the emerging global health threats, such as one that we are facing today with COVID-19.
We are proud to be contributing to the fight against COVID-19 by developing a made-in-Canada vaccine candidate, which is currently in development in the phase two/three program. We are a proud Canadian company, headquartered in Quebec City, making a significant contribution to jobs and investment in the national economy.
Let me spend a moment to introduce our technology and its uniqueness. Our vaccines are so-called virus-like particles, or VLPs, which mimic the shape and appearance of the virus without being pathogenic. Because of this feature, it induces a very strong and broad protection through the immune system when it's introduced. Also, our plant-based production capability is extremely versatile and positioned to support rapid response to the situation we are facing.
With our capability and platform, we can receive the genetic sequence information of the virus, which is applied to express the VLP vaccine candidate for rapid development. That would be suitable to the situation like the pandemic we are facing.
We are currently assessing the immune response of our current program against the Wuhan strain and against emerging new variants. We are contemplating developing a new vaccine against the emerging new variants as well.
During the current COVID-19 pandemic, Medicago has reallocated nearly all of its resources to developing a vaccine candidate and variants and has also tried to accelerate our path to increase Canada's domestic vaccine manufacturing capabilities. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the critical need for domestic manufacturing of vaccines and other products to ensure that Canada is prepared to protect its citizens from emerging infectious disease. Medicago is proud to provide domestic solutions—