Industry committee  There's likely seed funding within federal government programming.

Industry committee  There's a long list of issues. Certainly in terms of the internal barriers, internal trade is a key issue, and for any processing company, having consistent rules and regulations across the provinces is critically important. We see that being critically important in terms of at

Industry committee  I think the point is correct. There are a limited amount of R and D funds in the world, particularly in Canada. The challenge for Canadian businesses is to attract those funds, show that they can be used for commercialization purposes and better spinoff. It is like anything in

Industry committee  Employment has always been stable, so that's a good thing, but in terms of investment in R and D, as I mentioned, in terms of benchmarks to other countries, like the U.S. and the Netherlands, it's just not at the same level. Why? I would say the recession has caused a lot of comp

Industry committee  Most of the companies right now are focused on cutting costs—efficiency.

Industry committee  In Canada, we just don't have a system that has a strong collaboration, particularly in the food processing area, between academics, universities, and the private sector. There's a lot of discovery-type research in universities, and then the private sector tends to focus on its o

Industry committee  We've done some research in the Netherlands, and a lot of the focus there is if a university gets funding, it has to be tied to industry commitment and collaboration and industry skin in the game. As we move forward, particularly in Agriculture and Agri-food Canada's innovation p

Industry committee  In some cases, yes.

Industry committee  The food processing sector in Canada is very diverse. There's certainly a lot of areas in terms of where we need to attract global high-skilled talent, and many of the manufacturing sectors that you're investigating require that. Also, the food processing sector has the meat proc

Industry committee  If we use the example again of the meat processors, they do have a challenge to attract employees. They're not located, obviously, in urban centres. They're further away from universities or colleges. You have to make almost a cultural commitment to move into rural Canada if you

Industry committee  It's not necessarily just programs, I see the companies actually taking lot of initiative in attracting prospective employers to these areas. They have training programs within those areas. They ensure that there is housing. I think it's more of a combination between government a

Industry committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's my pleasure to appear before this committee as you study potential ways to improve competitiveness in the Canadian manufacturing industry. Today, I would like to provide you with some context on the Canadian food processing industry, including the i

Agriculture committee  I am not aware of any study that has undertaken to do that. Generally, we don't differentiate between GM and non-GM. We look at canola and the impact it has on the marketplace.

Agriculture committee  Yes.

Agriculture committee  I'm not aware of a study.