Mr. Chairman, I think it's a refreshing question to ask what we're doing in terms of positioning ourselves for the future. We are working actively. Behind that beef advantage initiative, we're working on a couple of pilot projects. One is currently under way. We're really working to try to get a traceability system that works, as we describe it, at the speed of commerce. We've seen some traceability systems around the world that only work if they're heavily subsidized, and witness how some of those countries are the most protectionist when it comes to reducing barriers.
On the other hand, we have seen some other programs that work well, and we believe Canada is one of the leading countries in the development of technologies that allow for the electronic transfer of information.
We're not necessarily expecting there will be huge premiums as a result of this, but there's going to be a growing expectation of improved traceability. Certainly our identification system, which our industry put in place, which gives you at least the herd of origin and the point at which that animal was processed, is better than almost all other countries that attended a forum in Argentina last week to take a look at where the world is at on that. We intend to work actively with efficient systems in between to fill that in.
What we really want to couple with that is a market-based system that will allow us to make industry improvement at the same time. Anytime a person is purchasing your product, it's the sum of its attributes they're interested in. It's how we continue our lead in quality, how we use it to produce more efficiently, and how we meet a whole variety of consumer preferences around the world. There are some who are very interested in traceability. There are some who are very interested in other particular attributes, who are going to be increasingly important to serve.
We're not going to be the low-cost producer in the world. We're the leading exporter in grain-fed beef products in the world or the high-quality beef that's sold throughout the world. We view this as important. We want to build our future on what we refer to as the value proposition, which is quality, safety, animal health, and our ability to service those markets.
We are working closely with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada—the Growing Forward initiative—and we intend this to be a major part of our activity over the next two years.