Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon, honourable members. Given the time allotted for our discussions, we have elected to restrict this brief introduction to providing the honourable committee members with a brief overview on how Health Canada sets safety standards for contami

Agriculture committee  Thank you, honourable member. The discrepancy with other standards does not really present itself in terms of violations of international agreements. Our work at Health Canada is to ensure that the standards that are in place are protective to human health. As was mentioned by p

Agriculture committee  It is pretty much the same situation. At least in the scientific information that we have seen, there is minimum information right now that makes the comparison between organic products versus non-organic products vis-à-vis the presence of these types of contaminants. There are o

Agriculture committee  It would be considered a data element that could be useful.

Agriculture committee  The standards that are currently present in our regulations are still enforceable. They are current. However, as was mentioned by previous witnesses, first of all, they are under review, because we're collecting data about them, but they're also narrow in the type of food commodi

Health committee  Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, honourable members. At the outset, like Dr. Hutchinson, I would like to apologize to committee members for being unable to table my opening remarks with you today. Unfortunately, again time did not allow for translation to be completed on

Health committee  That's excellent. Thank you. I would like to use this introduction to focus on some of the actions, including the regulatory actions, that will help address the serious public health concerns related to overconsumption of sodium in the Canadian food supply. These actions include

Health committee  Yes, I could start maybe with some elements of answers—

Health committee  —and maybe my colleagues could complete it. Definitely you're highlighting the complexity of the problem, because essentially we have an ingredient here that is ubiquitous in the food supply, that is present in a number of commodities. So given the health impacts that were ident

Health committee  There are definitely some delays in accomplishing the goals, and perhaps I would say there are several reasons for that. Some of it is related probably to the way the goals were set. There may have been over-ambitious goals originally when the sodium working group developed the d

Health committee  I could start.

Health committee  I guess there are two segments in your question, honourable member. You mentioned chemicals and additives, but you mentioned as well any types of issues related to food that have an impact on health. The answer to the second part of the question—whether there is an interest in de

Health committee  This is not a recent problem, as was stated, but the issue has been raised to a much greater extent since 2007, and since the announcement from the health minister that a Sodium Working Group was going to be established. There has been extra impetus since 2007. That doesn't mean

Health committee  There has been some progress but it is not a simple issue. We started more intensive efforts later than other countries, such as the United Kingdom which began in 2006. It should be pointed out however that sodium intake in Canada, currently, without our having yet implemented al

Health committee  Based on the data that is currently available, it is possible, since we have seen efforts to reduce consumption elsewhere. I do not want to speculate on the future. We will have to wait and see how these efforts to reduce consumption can be implemented. If other committee members