Agriculture committee  When I was in Saskatchewan earlier this year for a round table meeting with the ministers of agriculture out there about other matters, we got into a discussion about data. The ownership of and access to that data are an emerging issue. There are a couple of models that are flowi

Agriculture committee  The Canadian manufacturers of agricultural equipment tend to be very successful. When you go to a website for MacDon, for example, or others, the website is in two languages, English and Russian.

Agriculture committee  I'm sorry, but when they see the market, that's where the market is.

Agriculture committee  I was last through the MacDon plant about four years ago. Mr. MacDonald took me and somebody from John Deere through the plant at the time. I've not been there since, but certainly it's welcome to see an investment like that. As you've stated, they've carved out a niche in terms

Agriculture committee  Yes, and it all comes back to ensuring that you have the right skills on the production line. A year or two ago, we had a John Deere dealer in town for a meeting, and we were talking about corn and soybean planters. He said at that time they were taking delivery of 40 planters.

Agriculture committee  That's right. A great example of that is the precision farming systems with GPS technology that we see in farm equipment today. I'm sure that just about every combine that rolls across the Prairies has GPS systems in it now. One of the things I try to do is to get out and spend

Agriculture committee  There's a great example in the report that I'll circulate through the clerk, which shows a vision of a technology-using machine. The developer is a company called Blue River. It's now owned by John Deere. It's a pesticide sprayer, and what it does, especially in the high-value cr

Agriculture committee  There's a couple of areas that are important. One is access to skilled labour. When you talk to a company, whether that's MacDon in Winnipeg or companies elsewhere in the country, it's about access to skilled labour, whether they are the engineers that design the equipment, the w

Agriculture committee  It would be helpful to look forward into what the future will bring. Mr. Orb spoke about robotic tractors. There's a company in Saskatchewan in that space. Mr. Drouin, I'm sure there are dairy farms with robotic milkers in your constituency. We are in that phase. The next phase

Agriculture committee  Based on conversations I've had with colleagues in the United States, I can say that you would be surprised by some of the states and counties south of the border that also don't have the access to broadband that they need. This is the problem that Mr. Orb has pointed to. It's a

Agriculture committee  Yes, you're absolutely right. The typical combine, after a day in the field, will generate five gigabytes of data. That has to be uploaded if the farmer wishes to manage that data. It's not very efficient to put it on a stick and take it back to the farm, right? That doesn't quit

Agriculture committee  I wouldn't have the answer to that. I can certainly get back to you on it. I can tell you that the farm of the future will be a race over who is going to be the data manager. Mr. Orb has spoken about that. There may be studies by the CWTA—the Canadian Wireless and Telecommunicati

Agriculture committee  Also, the member from Glengarry—Prescott—Russell was standing in front of a milking parlour that I think was made by one of our member companies. The important thing to note is that the equipment manufacturers manufacture equipment that is used in many sectors, but in particula

Agriculture committee  Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair and honourable members of the committee, for allowing the Association of Equipment Manufacturers to appear this morning at this committee. As an introduction, allow me to say a few words about the member companies of the Association of

Finance committee  I will take the last question first. I think others on this panel may be better able to answer that question, but from what I've seen, there certainly is quite a call for harmonization or at least equalization between what our competitors in the United States are dealing with and