Public Safety committee  Don't forget, we're capitalists too.

Public Safety committee  Not at all, and as a matter of fact, the industry that worked more closely with Environment Canada at that time was the manufacturing industry, as opposed to the retailers. Because we tend to be in the middle, we tend to get the news last. Looking back historically as to the mistakes our organizations perhaps have made, we didn't protest strongly enough at the time manufacturers began consultations with government and we were not involved as directly as we should have been.

Public Safety committee  This is more to your point about ownership. When we analyzed the port facilities, a lot of them were municipal quasi-government. Some were non-profit, not-for-profit organizations and some were private. It was a mixed bag. But the government did not discern for eligibility based on that.

Public Safety committee  I think the goal here is harmonization to a standard, no matter which facility you come from, whether it be a large corporate facility, or a small, independent, rural-based facility. By making sure the standard is up to a certain level of government assistance, we're not going to base the program on the financial wherewithal to achieve that standard.

Public Safety committee  We are. The United States and Canada are certainly in the lead. Other countries that compete with us agriculturally—South America, certainly Brazil and Argentina, China, and India—are nowhere near as potentially secure as we are, but that also introduces some degree of competitive disadvantage.

Public Safety committee  They're taking the lead to do the risk assessment.

Public Safety committee  We believe there should be a shared responsibility. I think there is a cost of doing business, there's no question, to secure these products, and that also benefits the employees and the workers in terms of safety. It keeps our costs down and costs of operation for insurance purposes.

Public Safety committee  I'll just summarize. The piece in front of you that you received from the clerk prior to my verbal presentation outlined a few other areas that we did not directly address in our initial comments. There are additional costs—for example, the anhydrous ammonia nurse tanks requiring pressure testing, the decal programs, the E2 emergency preparedness regulations under CEPA, environmental protection, all of which are added costs.

Public Safety committee  The United States is the first country you could draw attention to. Currently, the agri-retail facilities in the U.S. have just completed a phase of risk assessment analysis where they had to submit paperwork that was due June 7 to the Department of Homeland Security. The homeland security department will assess, then, these various retail facilities, as well as the products they're carrying, to ultimately come up with a final risk assessment that will then require regulation and stewardship of the products.

Public Safety committee  Are you referring to perhaps more organic methods of farming versus conventional methods?

Public Safety committee  I think it's up for debate and still rather contentious as to whether organic products are more tasteful, more healthy, and necessarily more beneficial for Canadians. From a price standpoint, of our disposable incomes, Canadians only have to pay 10% of their disposable incomes on food.

Public Safety committee  Absolutely.

Public Safety committee  Per site, and if you multiply that by 1,500 sites—But then we did a statistical analysis to say that not all sites are going to require a full upgrade; some have existing infrastructure in place. So our statistical sort of bell curving suggested an average of $124,000 per site.

Public Safety committee  In terms of the Explosives Act, ammonium nitrate being an explosive precursor would fall under the Explosives Act; hydrous ammonia, however, tends to come under Transport; crystal meth issues tend to come under Health; obviously terrorist activity comes under Public Safety; and the economic and social consequences of our industry having issues would fall under Agriculture.

Public Safety committee  Perhaps I'll start, but I'm sure that Jeff has recollections as well, and he can sort of support any comments that I might miss. We brought this matter to the attention of several members of Parliament last November, in what we call the CAAR annual parliamentary forum. Unfortunately, it wasn't just one issue that we brought to their attention; we had several, so this may have been diluted.