Thank you.
Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, thank you very much for inviting the CBSA to participate in the hearings today.
The prairie region of the Canada Border Services Agency is responsible for securing prairie, Northwest Territories, and Canadian borders at our ports of entry, which consist of 37 border crossings, 5 airports, and 2 marine ports. Of the 1,216 CBSA employees in the region, 682 are border services officers. Since 2009, nearly 3 million air passengers, 460,000 commercial trucks, and nearly 1.3 million vehicles carrying 2.8 million travellers came into Canada through the prairie region ports of entry.
The CBSA region has seized drugs worth approximately $26 million in the last five years, $17 million of which has been seized in the last 12 months. The majority of the drug seizures in the past two years have involved cocaine from South America, doda from the United States, and khat from Africa. Other drugs seized to a lesser degree are heroin, hash oil, and, of course, marijuana.
Although the majority of the drug shipments that have arrived by air enter Canada through the major ports of entry in the east and through Vancouver, there have been increases in the number of drug shipments at our airports, Calgary International and Edmonton International. One of CBSA's challenges in identifying suspect containers and shipments through air mode is the use of legitimate companies by organized crime to conceal their drug shipments.
The enforcement mandate of the CBSA is delivered through the efforts of the port-of-entry operations and three enforcement divisions of our agency. The majority of our officers work at our ports of entry and are managed through a network of five district offices throughout the prairie provinces and the Northwest Territories. These front line officers, who are the first point of contact for the traveller's entry into our country, perform inspections on their goods and conveyances.
Complementing the front line staff are officers from the criminal investigations and intelligence divisions, as well as the inland enforcement division. The majority of these officers are located in Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Regina. In addition to those centralized units, officers are also located in offices in Coutts, Alberta; North Portal, Saskatchewan; and Emerson, Manitoba.
Criminal investigators are responsible for investigating, for the purpose of prosecuting, individuals who are purposely contravening the act we administer. In the prairie region, investigators prosecute a number of offences, including Immigration Refugee Protection Act-- IRPA--violations, handgun and firearms smuggling, child pornography, and currency violations. Our criminal investigators conduct criminal investigations into suspected cases of evasion or fraud with respect to over 80 federal acts that relate to border legislation.
Our inland enforcement officers locate and remove foreign nationals who enter Canada illegally or individuals, including permanent residents, whose admissibility status changes after they have entered Canada. This activity involves investigations in cooperation with other law enforcement agencies, which include the RCMP and the Canadian municipal police departments. Many of the people removed from the prairie region have been deemed inadmissible due to criminal activity committed in Canada or overseas. Some of those individuals have been, or are currently, members of various recognized organized crime groups, including the Afrikan Mafia, MS-13, the Clippers, Fresh Off the Boat, and Fresh Off the Boat Killers.
Finally, our intelligence officers and analysts are responsible for anticipating illegal activity that has not yet occurred and for providing tactical intelligence to all program areas so that our interdiction efforts are more effective and our officers' safety is protected. Many of the indicators used by BSOs--border services officers--to identify suspicious behaviour were developed within the intelligence program.
More directly related to your deliberations here today is the fact that our intelligence program is most frequently and directly involved in the gathering, analysis, and sharing of information related to organized crime.
Thank you.