Evidence of meeting #33 for International Trade in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was deal.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Ed Holder Conservative London West, ON
Do you have any sense of being able to quantify that in terms of the advantage of being ahead of the United States?
Again, I'm thinking of the pork producers in particular, but is there an advantage to pulse and lentils and wheat to be ahead of the United States in relation to the Canada-Colombia free trade deal?
Director, Grain Growers of Canada
We sell a lot of pulses--lentils, peas, chickpeas, beans--down in that area, and that's one of their major protein food sources. So, yes, if we can figure out some way to move this ahead a little bit more quickly and beat the U.S. on it, then I think there will be a chance for us to maybe supplement our incomes.
Also, we want the farmers down in Colombia to do okay, too. They produce coffee and bananas. I'm not out to talk about any of the other issues right now. We're farmers and they're farmers, and that's kind of how we look at it.
Conservative
Ed Holder Conservative London West, ON
So you actually think there's a humanitarian benefit as well to the Colombians within this kind of an arrangement, because it allows them to proactively export things that, frankly, we don't produce. Is that fair to say?
Conservative
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
You asked for a number, so I was just quickly doing the math. Right now we have 100,000 tonnes of pulses, 360,000 tonnes of wheat, and 60,000 tonnes of barley. That adds up to about $265 million or roughly one-quarter of a billion dollars a year of exports just in the grains and pulses.
I think perhaps what's key for all members to think of is that once somebody switches their flour mill over to a different class or to wheat from a different country and they get used to baking with that, there is then a bit of a higher hurdle for you to get your products back in again. Right now they are using a lot of Canadian products, so we would hate to lose that advantage and have them tool up to deal with other people's produce.
Conservative
Ed Holder Conservative London West, ON
I have a couple more brief questions, if I might, Mr. Chair. Thank you very much.
Mr. Phillips, I know you made some comment about preferring a multilateral deal over a bilateral deal, but again I'm compelled by what Mr. Rice said about how, with the weakening of Doha, there will seem to be, particularly in the United States, which is a country that we all pay some attention to, more emphasis on bilateral trades. If you had the option of no deal with Colombia or this bilateral deal, what would you take?
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
If everybody had no deal, then we'd all be equal, but—
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
—if one of our major competitors were going to move ahead and negotiate a deal that would give them a huge comparative advantage over us, then I'd say we would say go with the deal.
Conservative
Ed Holder Conservative London West, ON
Thank you very much.
Mr. Rice, just help me understand a little bit about the....
Am I done, sir?
Conservative
Conservative
Ed Holder Conservative London West, ON
All right. I apologize.
Thank you very much for your testimony.
Conservative
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome to the honoured guests here as well.
When I look at Canada's history, we have come across as a trading nation for the past 100 years, or whatever that timeframe is, and now we are looking at signing a free trade agreement with Colombia. You're here in particular as members of the Canadian grain market and the hog producers.
If I look at all the provinces of Canada, there's only one province--Saskatchewan--that has had positive growth and a surplus budget in the last year. The particular reason for that is that Saskatchewan is the province doing the most trade outside the North American market.
What is your opinion about that? Do you see that as one reason we should be opening up to new countries like Colombia?
Executive Director, Canadian Pork Council
We are seeing quite significant changes in the demographics of some of what have been our major markets. Japan, for example, is a country that has an aging population, a declining population. That has probably been our most important export market, but we have to have other alternatives to adjust to those changing circumstances. Japan will not be a growing market in the future. It'll only be a matter of perhaps some import replacement.
For industries to be able to compete internationally, they need large enough volumes. The domestic market of 35 million people is just simply not enough to sustain, over an 8,000-kilometre distance, companies so that they will be able to compete on the home market, let alone the world market. We are a totally free and open market for imports, so we have to have companies that can compete on both levels.
Liberal
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
First off, I would like to thank you for recognizing my home province of Saskatchewan as finally a have province.
I'll mention my hometown of Tisdale, Saskatchewan, just to put that on the record too.
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
In terms of the trade deals, I just want to reiterate that multilateral is our number one preferred approach. It really is. But in the absence of the multilaterals, we recognize that as other countries move ahead, we cannot be competitively disadvantaged. So we have to have the bilaterals until such time as that can happen.
Why is Saskatchewan doing so well? I have some numbers here. In Saskatchewan, 99.2% of all farms are export-dependent. That is why. when exports work well, farmers do well. Canada-wide, 91.6% of farms are export-dependent. Even in Quebec, 75% of the farms rely on either exports or export prices for their livelihood.
So it's huge to Canadian agriculture, and if....
I see you shrugging, Mr. Julian; I can certainly leave some of these stats with the committee.
These are not translated, but perhaps they can be translated and then distributed to all members.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
How much of a positive impact will this FTA have on our shipping grains overseas? Do you have some numbers there? You mentioned that you have to look for markets somewhere else, but do you see any positive growth particular to this Colombia mission?
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
I think Martin touched on it. Certain markets in the world are mature markets--Japan, for example--where there's already a large middle-income group that's already buying, that has the consumer taste to buy, finished pork products or high-quality breads or whatever.
The future in countries like Colombia is that there is a large young population. That's a market for the future. If we are in there and working with the Colombians, there's huge potential growth.
So there's a huge middle class coming, potentially, in countries like that. Whether it's Peru, Colombia--“emerging markets”, as I call them--there's huge potential for us there in the years ahead.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
You mentioned emerging markets. If we look at Canada's economic future, that probably lies in Asia, in countries like China and India.
You know, our good friend Peter Julian is concerned about all these human rights in Colombia.
When we look at the future ahead of us in terms of doing trade with India and China, do you think we still will have enough of a market over there so that our farmers have an advantage?
Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
I would almost insist on continuing to have our markets as diversified as possible. When the BSE crisis struck a few years ago, we found out what happened when we were so dependent on just one market, the United States.
I think it's really critical that Canada is trading across a wide range of marketplaces and not limiting ourselves to a few. If those borders close for some reason, bad things happen to us.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Do you see any short-term to long-term benefits that free trade is opening up? Even with these tough economic times that we are going through right now, do you see a bright future ahead of us? In other words, do you see this as a short-term solution or a long-term solution?
