Madam Speaker, I certainly am pleased to respond on behalf of the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food.
The member's question was when the border would open, but regarding the member's remarks in terms of strategy and plans, the member knows full well that we have had a strategy and a plan in place for a long time. We have worked aggressively in terms of getting the U.S. border open. In fact we are the only country, the first country which had BSE that moved back into a market. That is a first in the world. It shows the forward planning of the Government of Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in terms of our traceability, our identification system, and our good system of record keeping so that when we get into the science and making science based decisions, we have the evidence and we can move ahead.
In terms of strategy, the member knew when he previously asked the question that the minister made an announcement on September 10 which looked at six basic points. One of the key ones was that we needed to work with the industry to increase our slaughter capacity within this country. We are seeing some movement in that direction now.
The Government of Canada recognizes the importance of the U.S. market to Canadian producers. In fact the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food along with a number of his provincial counterparts and the industry went down to the U.S. capital last week. They made representations again not only on behalf of the cattle and beef sectors but also on behalf of all exporters of animal and meat affected by the border closure, including sheep, goat, bison, elk and the other ruminant industries. It is important to mention that.
I want to emphasize that Canada became the first country affected by BSE to regain access to the United States market. As a result of forward planning and forward looking by the Government of Canada, that partial reopening of the border meant that Canada exported over 300,000 tonnes of beef to the United States in 2004.
As the member knows full well, the Prime Minister got a commitment from President Bush on several occasions to reopen the border as soon as possible. That is extremely important with the process we are involved in now. That commitment bore fruit when the United States department of agriculture published the U.S. BSE minimal risk rule in the Federal Register on January 4. The hon. member must be aware that this rule is scheduled to take effect on March 7 this year.
When implemented the final rule will provide access to the United States for a range of live animals in beef and ruminant products. In particular the rule will once again allow for the importation into the United States of live cattle under 30 months of age for slaughter. That represents significant progress.
The Government of Canada will continue to work closely with the United States to see that the border is opened fully.