Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the committee for having me here today and for allowing us to share our comments about the preparation for budget 2019. The Canola Council of Canada is a value-chain organization that represents the whole canola industry in Canada. We represen

Finance committee  Biofuels have been proven to be a really excellent opportunity to lower greenhouse gas emissions. We as an industry have developed.... Canola in Canada is in the mandate that we have for biodiesel in Canada currently. A lot of it gets processed elsewhere and then comes back into

Finance committee  We do. All agreements that reduce barriers or tariffs are good. We have a superb trade negotiation group in agriculture in Canada. We are really well served by our civil servants when it comes to trade negotiations, in my view. We would be recommending to pursue trade agreements

Finance committee  In the implementation of the carbon pricing system, there is work being done both with what's called the federal backstop and also with a provincial program to introduce a carbon levy called an output-based pricing system. It's a transition mechanism for large energy users, espec

Finance committee  We're asking for access to that output-based pricing system so that we can transition to that environment.

Finance committee  No, those were the four.

Finance committee  We're not suggesting that carbon taxes are a bad policy. We're not experts on how to address climate change. We are in a globally competitive environment, and it's an extremely competitive environment with other oils globally. A tax in one jurisdiction that's not applied in ano

Agriculture committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the committee for having the Canola Council here today. The council, for those who don't know, is a value chain organization. It represents the 43,000 canola growers, the seed developers, the processors who turn canola seed into oil

Agriculture committee  I think that in the case of this kind of circumstance we have to look at all things. We have to look at all measures, including any possible chances we have to make sure that all importers are living up to their obligations under SPS rules and so on. Mr. Vossen referred to the pr

Agriculture committee  With SPS, it's much more complicated. I think our trade commissioners have to be really well suited to that kind of market access issue.

Agriculture committee  I think the recommendation was that there are issues of quality that have been raised. I saw on the weekend that the Chinese embassy here indicated they were open to a communications with Canada about the issue. I take that as an invitation, that this delegation would be accept

Agriculture committee  Sure. I think Mr. Jeworski and Mr. Vossen are probably better placed to answer that question, so I will turn it over to them. At the beginning of my testimony, I indicated that this market, China, is larger than the next three all put together that we have for seed, so it's a v

Agriculture committee  Mr. Chairman and committee, good afternoon, and thank you very much for having us today. We're very interested in talking about Canada's value-added canola sector and about increasing processing capacity for our exports of seed, meal and oil, as well as the domestic market thro

Agriculture committee  I am here today with Chris Vervaet, as you mentioned, from the Canadian Oilseed Processors Association. Our two associations work very closely. Competitiveness in the global export market is critical for the canola industry. We export 90% of what we produce in Canada, so we nee

Agriculture committee  Maybe I can start, and Chris can add a comment too. What we find, for example, is that there are maximum residue limits on seed and products that are exported from Canada and other markets, which are there to protect animal health and safety in various countries. Canada has a l