Evidence of meeting #144 for International Trade in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was crop.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
For a visitor to our committee, you're asking really good questions, and we appreciate that, but your time is up.
We're going to move to the Liberals now, with Madam Ludwig, for five minutes. Go ahead.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Thank you, Chair, and thank you all for your testimony today. That goes to the gentleman in the back as well.
I'm not from the west. I live in the east, and I certainly know that when there's any kind of impact on our fisheries in our communities, it's significant, and there's a real ripple effect. That's the position I'm coming from. Also, before I had the honour of representing New Brunswick Southwest, I taught international trade for over 20 years.
My question is for you three gentlemen. You've obviously made a conscious choice to be farmers, even though you saw your parents and grandparents and great-grandparents, in some cases, go through this kind of thing. What advice would you give to your children moving forward? We know, as you've mentioned, that in global markets the risk is higher and there's a level of uncertainty. How would you advise them to manoeuvre through this?
5:10 p.m.
Invernorth Ltd., As an Individual
I'll start.
I would equip them well to handle risk. I'd also make sure they knew how to look at their worst-case scenario. Programs such as crop insurance and AgriStability are important to farmers, and we're willing to pay into them toward that worst-case scenario.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Are you forecasting, Mr. Gerrard, that the crop insurance may increase?
5:10 p.m.
Invernorth Ltd., As an Individual
Do you mean payments to farmers?
The way our crop insurance works in Manitoba is that it's driven off yield, so it would not cover any price loss. AgriStability would.
5:10 p.m.
Newman Farms Ltd., As an Individual
In Alberta we have price protection in our crop insurance.
On the question of advice to my kids, we've diversified with our cattle and other things. When I went to school in the east, a lot of people were working off-farm to diversify, because we're not always busy. A lot of people have different ways to diversify for their kids, for example welding shops or other things, because sometimes there's no way you can make a living with this high risk.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Mr. Hanmer, I'm going to ask you a specific question—and thank you. You have a Bachelor of Science in agriculture. What changes have you seen from your studying days to now? When there were times of uncertainty and trade crises in the past, how were they overcome then compared with now?
5:10 p.m.
Hanmer Joint Venture, As an Individual
That's a great question. Again, this is not the first crisis we've seen. The big difference is that working capital has almost tripled since I started farming in 1996, so the costs and the risk that we're putting out in the fields every year are significantly impacted. In terms of the talent for risk and financial knowledge and agronomy, all the stakes are way higher now than they were then. I think there's a bigger playing field now. You have to have an appetite for risk; I get that. But you also have to have a knowledge of how to mitigate risk.
What we don't need is uncertainty in our markets, because that's the one thing we ask of our government, to have stable trade relations. The risks we're willing to assume have to do with weather and commodity prices—that's the game of farming—but we need stable market access.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Thank you.
Moving forward on that, looking at Canada-U.S. relations, we know that we have a very high dependence on one particular nation for exports. Similarly, is there any other comparable to Canada's overall heavy dependence on China right now?
I have two parts to this really big question.
China and Australia signed a trade agreement in 2015. Did that change the relationship and the harmonization of the tariffs?
5:10 p.m.
Hanmer Joint Venture, As an Individual
It's not my area of expertise, so I don't have an answer to that.
5:10 p.m.
Newman Farms Ltd., As an Individual
It's my field, and I don't think it.... The market was the market, and we follow the market and it's factored into that. The canola prices weren't bad the last couple of years, so it shouldn't....
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
To all three of you, in your farming, you're selling directly to Richardson or Viterra?
5:10 p.m.
Newman Farms Ltd., As an Individual
Or to Cargill, or whichever.... We sell to several companies.
We sell in increments throughout the year, just to manage risk because the price could go higher or go down, so everybody is hanging out with 10%. That's one of the reasons....
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I have a last quick question on labour.
One of the things we heard when we were going across the country regarding CPTPP, was the risk of not finding enough workers on the farms. How do you forecast that with this level of uncertainty, in securing labour for the next year?
5:10 p.m.
Hanmer Joint Venture, As an Individual
On our farm with the demise of the oil field, there is no shortage of labour wanting to be working on the farm right now.
5:10 p.m.
Newman Farms Ltd., As an Individual
We have kids starting out farming right now, so we have lots of help, and everybody has bigger machinery.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
Thank you. That wraps up your time, and that's the first round.
We probably have time for two more slots here this afternoon, so we're going to go right at it, and the Liberals will kick it off.
Mr. Peterson, you have the floor.
April 9th, 2019 / 5:10 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Thank you, gentlemen, for being with us today. It's been quite an informative afternoon.
I'm from a part of the country that's more urban, just north of the city of Toronto, but as you can tell by looking at me, I enjoy food so I appreciate all the work you do for all Canadians, and I laud you for your efforts and for the great success stories your enterprises have become.
Like a lot of people in eastern Canada, I had ancestors in the west. My grandparents moved from Teulon, Manitoba. I don't think it's in Mr. Sopuck's riding, but I think it's probably in Mr. Bezan's. It's great to see some Manitoba representation here today.
Just so I can get a little more background on the industry itself, I think we don't understand or appreciate enough the innovation and advancements in technology that the farming industry represents. As a crop, canola is probably a fine example of that. But just because of the processes that have been undertaken, your yields have been increasing, and I think a lot of that is based on technology and innovation.
Do you want to spend a few minutes expanding on the importance of that in your industries?
5:15 p.m.
Invernorth Ltd., As an Individual
I can talk a little about that, yes.
We've become more moisture efficient. I think it is one of the big things in some of the drier areas of western Canada. We will switch to no till, which conserves more moisture and that increases yields. We started using more fertilizer and better seeding techniques, with more precise seeding more precise fertilizer placement. We just have more knowledge, and yes, more technology.
I think it has really increased our production. For example, we used to think that 50 to 55 bushels of wheat per acre was a really good crop. Now in some years we've produced almost double that, so it's been huge, and that is part of the challenge when we're talking about rail movement and some of these other things too.
5:15 p.m.
Newman Farms Ltd., As an Individual
With the technologies that have come along for us, we're using our fertilizer more efficiently and using fewer sprays and chemicals because of the way we're using these techniques. With our rotations, we have less pressure from disease and problems with our crops than we used to have.
As he said, our yields have pretty well doubled too. It's a variety of things, but there are better seed qualities out there. It's not all GMO. A lot of it is just great practice. Everybody has a better angle.
The Saskatchewan boys always design a new air drill or something that's more innovative and better; this is a great country for that and we have a lot of innovation.
5:15 p.m.
Hanmer Joint Venture, As an Individual
The only thing I'd add is that GPS guidance is the backdrop that started the quest for guidance and zone control, and now we're also into site-specific farming where prescriptive nutrition plans will automatically control different fertilizers as we're going up and down the field. The allows us to prescribe a site-specific nutrition plan.
We also have the innovation of that hybridization of canola. That's been one of the greatest advancements in my farming career, basically being able to make canola an Olympic athlete, expressing in its genetics once a year. That's what you've seen in the lift of the ability. Corn is a hybrid, and other crops around the world are hybridized, but the hybridization of canola has been huge.
I want to mention how we price our stuff. Farmers don't take their bucket of canola to the elevator to see what they can get. It's a strategic cash flow plan. Incorporated into that is the use of things like the Winnipeg ICE futures canola contract where we have mechanisms to defer price risk. We have the ability to do that as well.
That is where we're looking at the future. The canola market does not look good in the futures markets right now; it's based on a lot of risk.
5:15 p.m.
Liberal