Agriculture committee  I don't have a proportionate number in front of me, but I would say I'm not sure that.... I don't have the evidence one way or the other in front of me. We do dedicate.... The minister mentioned, certainly, the support we've provided on the standards side and the renewal of the standards.

Agriculture committee  There are a couple of things. In the short term, where we would look to see if we were meeting the demand of producers would be in programs like the advance payment program and also through the Farm Credit Corporation. Were we seeing a big uptick in demand? I would say we managed.

Agriculture committee  The second area will be new technology like clean technology, and then precision agriculture. It will be in partnership with the provinces and territories. They would have to match at least 50%, so we're leveraging provincial-territorial dollars on top of that. Sorry for the delay there.

Agriculture committee  We do have the first year's programming under the Canadian agriculture partnership there. As you point out, public trust is a key issue for the sector, I would say, both through some of the federal programming—the agri-assurance program as an example—and also through some of the cost-shared programming that provinces and territories would be delivering.

Agriculture committee  Sure, I'm happy to do this. What we did with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency was to agree that we would be better served—it sounds, I would say, in some sense potentially overly simplistic—by having a single assistant deputy minister who was overlooking most of our activities that were related to market access internationally.

Agriculture committee  In some sense it already is rolled out. A big chunk of it is actually our presence here in Ottawa. It is already rolled out. What it might do abroad, and we generally tend to post people abroad for three- to four-year terms, is that as people are renewed, we'd look to make sure we have the right complement in the right places over time, that we're not duplicating each other's work between CFIA and AAFC.

Agriculture committee  Yes, that's the usual procedure. That is what happens with all issues before cabinet.

Agriculture committee  Sure. Why don't I start off on that. There are a couple of things. The money under the career focus program is obviously for students to get work experience in the areas of interest to them. I think this is a great chance to bring people into the sector. It's a broader program that obviously works across the government.

Agriculture committee  The minister mentioned that the government has set up six economic strategy tables, one of which is in agri-food. Certainly, I support that table. I would say one of the issues that has come up is exactly that. How do we engage students to encourage them to participate in agriculture?

Agriculture committee  Yes, that's right.

Agriculture committee  I have a couple of points. First, we have the means to converse directly with people in the sector. This is particularly the case with the round tables, of which we have 13 I think. One of them deals with issues in the grain sector and another addresses issues in the chicken industry.

Agriculture committee  I may not answer first-hand, but I hope the industry, if you asked them, would tell you the same thing they're telling me: that our efforts have improved communication between them and the Department of Health, in this case. We are confident that important information is shared by the Department of Health.

Agriculture committee  The Department of Health held a consultation. I think it was at the end of April and most of the people in our industry who participated in this consultation expressed their views on what the government was saying. I am not a member of cabinet, but we provide advice to the minister, who can pass it on to his cabinet colleagues.

Agriculture committee  Thank you. Maybe I'll give just a brief answer on that. Obviously, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada has a chief agricultural negotiator who participates at the officials' level at all the rounds of negotiation. There have been seven formal rounds of negotiation so far, plus some side discussions, and we've been intimately involved in all the negotiation rounds.

Agriculture committee  Certainly on issues like this we do collaborate with colleagues. I can't comment on the specifics of the letter itself, but we're aware of this issue. We've heard from stakeholders about it. As you say, we've had discussions with the private sector and with Innovation, Science and Economic Development, so other than saying that I can't personally comment on the letter, I think it's certainly an issue that we're aware of and we've done work on.