Mr. Speaker, the easiest way to understand the problem is to understand the dynamic it has created. I will therefore read a message I received from a producer at the end of March. “Dear Madam. I am sending you this message today to ask that you speak to the government on our behalf. Let me introduce myself. My name is Genevieve Audet. I am the owner of Ronick farm, a beautiful family-owned dairy farm in Ste-Gertrude. I need your help in defending supply management, a world model of responsible production that requires no subsidies, and which is suffering greatly as a result of the importation of milk proteins from the United States. The futures of many dairy farms are in jeopardy as a result of the significant drop in the price paid for milk at the farm, which does not cover the production costs, according to the Canadian Dairy Commission. The government needs to enforce its laws at the border to prevent these proteins from entering the country. They do not meet Canadian standards, they favour processors, they mislead consumers, and they hurt our economy. I hope I have made the right choice, Madam, and that you will choose to defend us”.
Other comments received afterwards clearly show how dairy producers feel.
“For some years now, we feel as though the government has turned its backs on us. Agricultural funding keeps getting slashed as our revenues dwindle, and all these agreements we are entering into only serve to open our borders ever wider, leaving us at the mercy of market forces...We have the potential to be a great economic force, but the government does not seem to realize it...I do not know whether you are aware of this, but many start-ups are struggling to such a degree that they are on the verge of selling, and their creditors have all but lost faith in the industry...Agriculture feeds the world, which is why I cannot understand why nothing is being done to remedy the situation. What will we do when there is no one left to feed us? Thank you very much for taking the time to read my words...I appreciate it a great deal and hope you will be able to share them with others today”.
That pretty well sums up what several producers in my community are going through. From 2007 to 2016, the number of dairy farms in Abitibi—Témiscamingue dropped 24%. There are only 114 left, compared to 150 10 years ago. The industry accounts for some 1,200 jobs in my riding alone. Of those, 826 are employed by dairy farms and 493 by food processors. I have a specific example in mind. Many cheesemakers have opened shop. Some of the top-quality cheeses they produce have even claimed awards on the world stage, like the Cru du Clocher.
Every year, the Conservative government's failure to act has resulted in shortfalls of $12,000 to $15,000 per farm, and now, it is the Liberals' turn to sit on their hands.
Do members truly believe most people have the means to fill a $15,000 hole in their budget? Several Liberal MPs are not earning the same salary as they once did. Though that may be the case, most people still have a hard time absorbing a $15,000 loss.
In Quebec, this industry accounts for 80,000 direct and indirect jobs, contributes $6.2 billion to the GDP and brings in $1.29 billion in tax revenues—$678 million to the federal government and $454 million to the province. There are 5,856 dairy farms producing almost 3 billion litres of milk annually. Revenues for these farms total more than $2.4 billion only in Quebec.
Failing to protect an industry that is so vital to our economy by not making sure that existing regulations and rules are enforced is absolutely appalling.
That is what is so shocking. Everything is already in place; all we have to do is get up one morning, roll up our sleeves, stop pretending that the problem does not exist and make sure that producers are not losing money. Milk is milk, that is all. Nobody here is going to tell me that a cow in the U.S. does not produce the same milk as a cow in Canada. Of course, the controls are not the same, but still, milk is milk. It is not hard to understand.
If it is as simple as that, it should be easy for this government to call the Border Services Agency and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and get them to talk to one another and agree on a single definition of what “milk” is, and to keep Americans from circumventing our laws to bring in diafiltered milk.
This basically means that this government, if it had a sense of what it means to act with communities in mind, could settle the issue in less than a week, because no legislative change is required. All the government has to do is to get a move on. It boggles the mind that we are forced to tell the government to do its job. I do not think that I should have to talk about this. This issue should have been at the top of the government's agenda, especially after an election. The Liberals cannot pretend that they were not aware of the problem, because we talked about it during the campaign.
It feels like there was a breach in the space-time continuum for the Liberals. They do not remember what happened during the campaign. For them, it is like 50 years have passed, like they went through a black hole and forgot everything that was discussed during the election.
What I am asking the government to do is simple. I am asking it to protect the farms in my riding. I am asking it to ensure that the young people who decided to become dairy producers do not regret their decision, although they realize that there are some serious challenges, especially with respect to collecting the money required to buy back quotas. The government will have to ensure that in my riding people can continue to produce high-quality dairy products, such as cheeses. It must ensure that producers have the financial flexibility they need to put money aside, so that they can pay for their children's education.
I remind the Liberal government that operating a farm is not like it used to be. In the past, someone could run a farm after finishing grade two. Now, that person needs a lot of knowledge. They need knowledge of management, administration, and agronomics. Often, if they want to be successful, they need to seek out training and information. Even if producers want to pass on the farm to their children, they need to be able to afford training for these children so that they can properly hand over the business. We are talking about keeping up with something rather simple, which is feeding our communities. Canadians need to be able to feed Canadians. That seems logical to me.
I hope that the government realizes that it is possible to take action in very short order. I hope it will decide to climb out of this black hole it has jumped into and that it will follow through with what it said during the campaign. I hope that the Liberals will leave here and visit their ridings during constituency week, that they will do what they need to do, and that they will fix this problem. Too many family farms have shut down. I hope the Liberals will fix this, because the inaction we have seen so far is truly shameful.
Lastly, I hope that there will be good news in the next few days for the dairy producers in my riding.