Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good morning, gentlemen. It's a pleasure to see you.
It's obvious that there is a strong trend for biofuels in Canada at the present time among citizens, politicians, industry and even environmentalists. Obviously, I'm all in favor of protecting the environment.
Generally speaking however we know that there are still some concerns about biofuels, whether it be ethanol, biodiesel or something else.
Mr. Row has referred to the impact this could have on agriculture. There are two important levels of oil products. As we know, the price of oil is set on a global basis. It's never based on supply and demand and it always increases, which leads to significant profits.
Mr. Perez, you talked about the price of biofuels, i.e. ethanol, in the context of getting the best price possible in a competitive market within free trade. So, on the one hand, we know that oil prices are always very high and, on the other hand, we want to get to the best price possible for biofuels, among them ethanol.
Isn't there an imbalance there?
At a previous meeting, I asked if this could have a negative impact on agriculture. If people invest and the price of oil increases, the share of ethanol in the fuels mix will increase.
Mr. Row referred to the need to ensure there is some balance between feasibility, or environmental impact, and financial returns.
I would like you to try to give us an overall idea of the real impact of all this, both on agriculture and on oil companies. I suppose that the main objective of oil companies will always be to make profits and to make sure that we will keep using gasoline in the long run.
Could you give us an overall view of those components: the price of oil, the price of ethanol and all those other biofuels, and the impact on agriculture?