International Trade Committee on April 20th, 2016

[Natashia Stinka]

That decision was taken by PotashCorp. That was an independent decision. Canpotex is only responsible for the marketing and delivering of potash. We're not a part of the production decisions of PotashCorp or any of our shareholders. I'm just putting a plug in there.

[Karen Ludwig, Liberal, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Thank you.

My next question is for Mr. Michnik.

Certainly as someone who has been involved with trade training over the last 25 years, I'm very familiar with STEP and the great work you have done as well as the chamber of commerce. With your work here in the province, how closely are you aligned with the universities and colleges as well as the four aboriginal and northern educational institutions?

[Brad Michnik]

We're aligned with the educational institutions in the sense that they work with us to attract international students as well as to look for research partnerships around the world. On the training side, we're involved as well. For example, we're a big proponent of the FITT program. We delivered that at one time and now it's done through the Hanlon Centre. We're on the advisory board of the Hanlon Centre. We're definitely working very closely with the educational institutions in the province.

[Kent Smith-Windsor]

If I may make some comments related to first nations engagement, I'll take this opportunity to plug your next visit to Saskatoon for the World Indigenous Business Forum, which starts, I believe, on August 23. It begins with a music festival. Over the last three years there have been several bands in Saskatchewan that have provided insight and assistance, particularly in South America, as it relates to indigenous engagement in the economy. We have many leaders who are quite proficient at learning how to create economic opportunity out of these elements. Initially, although not exclusively, the uranium industry were leaders and more recently there has been significant participation by the potash industry.

Whenever we look at indigenous or first nations and Métis engagement in our economy, we're not where we should be, but our genuine sense is that we're better off in our level of engagement than perhaps anywhere else in the country.

[Karen Ludwig, Liberal, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

I'm just going to go to the educational thing here. Certainly looking at the province of Saskatchewan, you're very fortunate, as our chair has mentioned, with the numbers of young people you have in this province. Looking at succession planning for your businesses, we see you've been quite successful in diversifying with 54% of your provincial economy relying on or dependent on the U.S. for exports. The rest of it is diversified.

What are the opportunities? Is there an opportunity through the STEP program to look at the universities and colleges and to do some mentorship and some partnering to bring in young people, in terms of working with business planning and businesses that are looking to go international or that are international?

[Brad Michnik]

We've done some of that. We can do more. As part of my involvement with the Hanlon Centre, we're even looking at instituting a program in which students go to work with Saskatchewan exporters on certain projects within the classroom settings. Rather than doing a case study from a textbook, they're writing a marketing plan for an existing Saskatchewan business.

There's a huge need out there. We do a bit in that area. We can do measurably more in terms of the training and bringing up that next level. We need more exporters and we recognize that, but it's a big job to work with that group and bring their skills up to the point where they're going to take their products to market internationally.

[Richard Wansbutter]

You touched on something I think is very important to us and in which we as Viterra have invested. When I say invested, I mean we're working with community colleges and universities on scholarships. We've announced a number of them to assist students with post-secondary education, which is really critical, and our first nations. We've targeted dollars specifically for that.

You're right. For a long time agriculture was not the place to be. Also, people were siphoned off to oil and gas. Given what we see in agriculture and its growth, we're definitely going to need trained and skilled people, so we're already starting to invest and have been doing so for a number of years.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you very much. Those are good questions. We're coming to the end. We've done well today and have had time for everyone to ask a question or to speak. We'll go to Mr. Van Kesteren for the last five minutes.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you for being here. It's great, informative stuff again.

Mr. Ritz was mentioning something about this, and we've heard repeatedly that the multinationals are going to manipulate it and that they're using this agreement to strengthen their position. It stands to reason that if that were the case, then there would also be those types of charges from other countries. Has anybody heard from, say, Chile or Japan of groups that are concerned about those things as well? Or is this just something we're hearing on this side?

[Kent Smith-Windsor]

At the three chambers, we actually continue to explore additional venues and opportunities to expand trade. We're involved in the International Chamber of Commerce and the World Chambers Federation, and whenever conversations happen in this area or others, from a business perspective they're always about how we can do more. The understanding is that a true customer relationship deals with mutual benefit. If you're not providing service with value, you're probably not going to be a supplier for very long.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Mr. Wansbutter, being a multinational, are you getting that pressure from other countries?

[Richard Wansbutter]

Certainly my experience has been that trade in agriculture is pretty transparent and open. The issue, though, for us—and it's been touched on by a number presenters—really is about having science-based rules. That's where we get hung up. It isn't multinationals exerting influence, but we get caught up with misaligned rules and regulations on phytosanitary issues, on maximum residue levels, on issues dealing with biotech. That'll mess up a market for you in a heartbeat if you aren't aligned. That's where the really critical work needs to be done.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Good, thank you.

Kent, I'm going to go back to you. It wasn't you, but another presenter was talking about the infrastructure that is badly wanting in Saskatchewan. I think it's probably the case throughout this country. I'm thinking of transportation on the roads and the rail. Do you think that it would make good sense for the governments, should they agree on this agreement, to have a focus and a plan that would strengthen those types of rail investments? The governments were talking about a passenger-rail system from Quebec to Windsor for $40 billion or something. How do you feel about that?

[Kent Smith-Windsor]

Ports probably are the biggest pain point. That being said, Saskatoon is facing an increased trend line relating to car movements for commodities. There are probably pressure points all across the country that we ought to be paying attention to. When people talk about infrastructure, the talk tends to stay away from the things that are not glamorous but that are required.

At a municipal level, those might well be things like water and sewer, while they get attracted to the next new project that might come forward. Certainly from a rail perspective, investment in this area is mission-critical infrastructure that is really at the root of Canada's existence.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

A national strategy that would focus on those things would be something.

Does anybody else want to jump in on that?

Please, go ahead.

[Natashia Stinka]

One thing that has been in the news a lot lately is the CTA review. The final report came up with an interesting concept around infrastructure and transportation, which was to look at the transportation system as a way to facilitate trade. I think that's a really important concept, especially for a province like Saskatchewan. We're 1,600 kilometres from the west coast and there are the Rocky Mountains and very inhospitable terrain in between.

Whatever happens at the port and the infrastructure needed there has an effect all the way back to Saskatchewan in terms of the rail and the roads and the entire corridor needed to get the potash and so on to those trade ports.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

That's something we need to focus on.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

You have only a few seconds.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Very quickly I'll say thank you, but I'd also just say that you're so right about Brazil. Brazil of course has tariffs on everything, and if something is not produced in Brazil, then you're going to have to pay for it, and that economy is just collapsing. It's just absolute proof that system doesn't work.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Van Kesteren.

Thank you, panel members. This is the final panel this morning and we've had quite the fulfilling day here today. It was great to be in Saskatchewan and to hear all of the witnesses and to have everybody who visited in our audience today.

We're going to close this meeting, and we're heading to Manitoba.

The meeting is adjourned.