Madam Speaker, I too am rising to support my colleague, the MP for Kootenay—Columbia, on declaring the Friday before Thanksgiving national local food day. That would be very celebrated in my province of Alberta.
Among those I count as heroes of the planet are the agricultural producers of Alberta, who have fought valiantly to protect agricultural land. They have battled urban sprawl, industrial projects, and the paving over of prime agricultural land, including my city's most frost-free, productive market garden land.
For many decades, I have been honoured to provide legal representation and advocacy support to many of these farmers trying to protect their productive lands. I wish to single out just a few of the names of the Alberta farmers who I honoured some years back for their personal dedication in protecting Alberta's prime agricultural land.
There was the Bocock family, which donated their leading-edge dairy farm to the University of Alberta for research; and George Friesen and Jim Hainsworth, who founded the Preserve Agricultural Land Foundation. George put a covenant on his own productive land to say that he only had the right to grow and produce on his land, not profit from putting a pipeline through. Jim Visser, the Kuhlmanns, the Vriens, and Wayne Groot, the potato farmer, fought valiantly to protect the northeast market gardeners. Doug Visser has mounted a major campaign to protect Lady Flower Gardens, run by and benefiting the homeless and the disadvantaged in Edmonton, who go out and grow the vegetables and take them back for their sustenance. Many hundreds of Edmontonians attended hearings on calls to preserve our northeast market gardens to produce healthy local foods for Edmontonians.
Many Edmonton restaurants now feature locally produced food. Many bakeries produce baked goods using local grain, including my favourite, and very popular, neighbourhood bakery, the Boulangerie Bonjour.
Among the greatest tributes I have received in my life is a lifetime membership to the Preserve Agricultural Land Foundation. Since childhood, I have accompanied parents, grandparents, and now friends and constituents to the downtown market, and now the Strathcona market in Old Strathcona and at La Cité Francophone, the quartier francophone of Edmonton, the only one in Canada.
I not only try to visit my market each Saturday, I regularly buy local organic carrots, parsnips, and berries and put them in my carry-on luggage, which really throws off the security officers every week.
A growing number of community gardens across my riding and the city are growing local produce for Edmontonians. The Green & Gold Community Garden, at the University of Alberta south campus, for 10 years has been producing local produce, and the funds go to global benefit, with the profits going to a women's collective in Rwanda.
Another garden close to the University of Alberta provides fresh produce to the food bank. Last year, Danielle Munroe worked with Youth Empowerment and Support Services, persuading the city to let them plant vegetables on a large empty lot across from the project, and it became a popular drop-in centre for everyone in the city to come to.
Now the Edmonton Food Council has created support for urban beekeeping and hens, promoting local plot cultivation, including across the street from me in an empty lot. There is now competition for who can grow the most local vegetables. That is not to mention provincial support for local craft breweries and distilleries, many of which are in my riding and that people are enjoying, particularly the locally crafted gin.
We must also recognize the importance and acknowledge the treaty rights of indigenous peoples to harvest their local foods. I work closely with first nations adjacent to the lake where I spent my summers, where they are concerned that they are losing the ability to harvest their local medicines. It is very important to consider that in projects being proposed.
The Province of Alberta has actually taken new steps to raise the profile of local food production, supported with one billion dollars toward local food industries. It tabled the supporting Alberta's local food sector act to raise the profile of the local food industry, strengthen consumer confidence in local foods, identify solutions and challenges faced by local producers and processors, and support sustainable growth in agriculture and food processing. It would establish a local food council and declare a new Alberta local food week, during the third week in August, which could lead into the Friday before Thanksgiving. It would provide a level playing field for certified local organic farmers and processors and build trust in the purchase of local food.
Local food sales in Alberta from farmers' markets and through direct-to-consumer channels have more than doubled since 2008, exceeding $1 billion last year alone. Now we have several companies in Edmonton that are delivering this local produce to my constituents' doors.
It is important to recognize that what is considered local food is now very diverse. There are many in my constituency who have actually established community gardens for new immigrants so they can grow the vegetables and produce they are used to.
With that, I will close so that there is plenty of time for my colleague to give his final comments on this very important bill.