Agriculture committee  Thank you. Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Poissant, good morning. Thank you for inviting us to your committee to share with you our observations on debt in the agricultural sector. My name is Michèle Lalancette. I am the mother of two wonderful children, a proud farmer fr

Agriculture committee  I am sure you know that that has been a crusade of ours in Quebec for several years. The long-term effect of the situation, which is more and more common, is that young people will never have agricultural assets, just as you just said. They will never be owners, just tenants. Bas

Agriculture committee  We are not saying that no model is possible. However, we have been looking at different models for four years, and we have not found a single one that has met the needs both of young farmers and of speculators. One of the two always has to compromise a lot. Often, it is the young

Agriculture committee  That is our big concern: there is no long-term vision. At the moment, it is still a marginal problem that is not too bad. However, it is becoming worse and worse. Perhaps it is not so much of problem at the moment, but what will things be like in 50 years? Who will be there to bu

Agriculture committee  In terms of access to land, we have to find some way or other to give priority to young farmers rather than speculators. There are a various models. All sorts of things are out there. You could study some of them. We had already thought of one measure in particular. We also spok

Agriculture committee  The FCC surplus could be used.

Agriculture committee  They have to have outside income. So they cannot devote themselves fully to their farms and put all their energy into developing the business in the first years. That is one of the solutions that appealed to us.

Agriculture committee  Yes, we do a lot of promotion. Actually, 80% of the new generation have a college diploma or a higher education degree. The business plan is an integral part of those courses. The new generation is trained to develop business plans, but the previous one was not. Often, when a yo

Agriculture committee  In Quebec, for more than 20 years, we have what are called CREAs, the Centres régionaux d'établissement en agriculture in Quebec. They bring together people with a lot of experience in providing support during transfers. Those people use their knowledge in human relations to make

Agriculture committee  The challenge is to connect them and then establish the transfer, making the transaction feasible.

Agriculture committee  That's why I was just telling you about the seller-lender formula, whereby parents are no longer shareholders of the business but retain ownership of the loan that the young person reimburses gradually. The young person therefore does not have a large amount to pay at once. In Qu

Agriculture committee  The bill was definitely very interesting. There must be a way to bring it back to the table or to introduce another one. Either way, it would have to be more advantageous for farms to be transferred, not dismantled. You are the experts who can make it more beneficial for sellers

Agriculture committee  I quite agree with Mr. Beierbach. Yes, it is necessary to own at least some of the land, which can be capitalized. I have nothing else to add.