Mr. Chair, as the member for Westlock—St. Paul said, it is an honour and a privilege to serve on the agriculture committee. I had the great opportunity to do that for a number of years and ended up chairing it over a couple of seasons. We worked very well and the member for Malpeque is giving me a compliment. I want that circled on the agenda because it just does not happen often.
When it comes to product of Canada, we were after a situation where the consumers were served in their best interests and also it helped Canadian producers to showcase their top quality products.
We started with a consultation phase over some months that saw some 1,500 interventions. Over 90% of them recommended the 98%. We built a very fulsome program that has been embraced by the vast majority of Canadian consumers and by the vast majority of Canadian processors.
They are struggling to come to that standard in a number of different ways. As I said earlier to some of the other interventions, we are seeing some great work done with 100% Canadian potatoes and then listing the other ingredients as well, but it lets people know that the base is 100% Canadian. I think that is an excellent opportunity to showcase all those different situations.
A 98% product of Canada is the ultimate marketing tool. It tells consumers that there is no concern. Everything is Canadian and it lives up to those very high standards that we enforce.
If we were to drop to lower standards, it would allow for the perversions that we used to see under the old rules where it was based on cost and not content. We want truth in labelling. We want a marketing tool that benefits consumers and benefits producers here in this country.