Good afternoon and thank you for the opportunity to speak to all of you today on the proposed free trade negotiations between Canada and Ecuador.
I'll tell you a bit about CPMA. We represent over 850 companies that grow, pack, ship and sell fresh fruits and vegetables in Canada. In fact, our membership is responsible for 90% of the fresh fruit and vegetable sales in Canada. Our industry supply chain contributes almost $15 billion in GDP. We support over 185,000 jobs in communities from coast to coast.
Our produce supply chain is unique. While it is a vital part of the fabric of our rural and urban landscape, supporting the growing and selling of a range of Canadian-grown products, we also rely heavily on our global partners to supply Canadians with safe and healthy products year-round. This includes a diversity of cultures in Canada, which of course drives consumer demand for products that are traditionally not grown in Canada or that cannot be grown in Canada. As a result of our colder climate and shorter growing season, coupled with the demand for this wide variety of products, four dollars out of every five spent on fresh fruits and vegetables in Canada are spent on imported product.
Therefore, to ensure the ongoing viability of the Canadian food system, we need a strong domestic and global strategy. The Government of Canada needs to recognize and prioritize food as an essential item in framing our trade agreements, with the fundamental goal of supporting domestic markets while strengthening food security and ensuring product diversity.
Important trading relationships already exist between Canada and Ecuador when it comes to fresh produce. Overall, we imported $89.6 million of fresh produce from Ecuador last year alone. This represents a 10% increase over the previous year. Canada’s trade with Ecuador also offers complementary export opportunities. As you know, Canada exports lentils, seeds, wheat, barley, peas and oats to Ecuador. Within that context, produce is also imported, including bananas, of course—no surprise—at $65 million-plus in 2023; pineapples at $4 million-plus; salad, beetroot, celeriac, radish and others similar at $2.3 million; and guavas, mangoes and mangosteen at close to $1.5 million. There's a theme there. These are mostly products not produced in Canada.
There is also keen interest among Canadian importers for other fresh produce commodities from Ecuador. CPMA annually surveys its membership to identify the products from new source countries of greatest interest to Canadian importers. This information is then shared, of course, with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to help them in terms of prioritizing their pest risk analysis resources and activities. Grapes from Ecuador have consistently been ranked among our members’ top priorities for improved market access over the past few years.
As a representative of a highly globally integrated industry, CPMA is strongly supportive of the Canadian government’s progressive trade agenda and its commitment to strengthening our trading partnerships across the Americas. CPMA emphasizes that Canada’s free trade agreements can and should support regulatory harmonization that can lead to the adoption of higher standards and regulations across countries, ensuring that products and services meet the same safety and quality standards we have while also, of course, reducing regulatory burden and associated compliance costs for businesses. Phytosanitary and other requirements that are not science-based or essential to security act as effective non-tariff trade barriers between trading partners and must be eliminated.
As I think this committee well knows, trade flows have fluctuated over the past few years due to escalating geopolitical conflicts, massive supply chain disruptions and ongoing extreme weather events. It is therefore more and more important that Canada enables free trade agreements with countries within a geography that enables importers to pivot and adjust their buying behaviour if these issues impact the flow of fresh fruits and vegetables. A free trade agreement with Ecuador offers one such opportunity to diversify product sourcing for Canadians.
In closing, CPMA once managed the U.S. duties for industry that were phased out under the CUSFTA and then NAFTA, along with the phase-out of duties with Mexico and Chile. Expanding these free trade agreements for fruits and vegetables is vital as we navigate a world of high food inflation and growing production challenges. We experience that every day.
Thank you for this opportunity. I look forward to our question and answer period.