International Trade committee  Well, all of our sectors of agriculture would benefit from any increased labour mobility, particularly in Alberta. Alberta is a relatively lightly populated province. Certainly the ability of workers from other parts of Canada or other parts of the world to come to Alberta, becom

International Trade committee  The things that get left on the table are cattle coming to the processing plants and the utilization rates in the processing plants. Partly as a result of shortages of cattle and shortages of labour, but also market access elements as we expand the market access here, our proces

International Trade committee  I believe most of it was a result of the free trade agreement Australia has and the tariff advantage it provided to Australia. When we look at the potential benefits of the trade, I think part of our information goes back to history and the values of exports that we had before th

International Trade committee  One of the great advantages of export markets is the ability to sell products to an export market for greater value than you would receive selling those products within North America—taking each cut of beef and selling it to the best market for that cut. Japan and the Asian marke

International Trade committee  Certainly we are concerned about a declining cattle market, and the other members of the supply chain, the processing and feeding sector, are concerned about that too. I think reversing the decline in the cattle market—and we hope that it is starting to take place right now—is b

International Trade committee  From our perspective, we don't believe labelling should be a trade barrier. One of the misconceptions with country of origin labelling is that we're opposed to labelling beef as Canadian beef, which we're not at all. When we sell beef in other countries, we're proud to call it Ca

International Trade committee  The Canadian agriculture industry is chronically short of labour. The shortage is probably most acute in the processing plants, but it goes right through the farming and ranching sector. We're missing opportunities now because of lack of labour. Our ability to prosper as an indus

International Trade committee  Yes, I do have a final comment. I want to thank you again for the opportunity to present today. I appreciate having the chance to tell you about the Alberta perspective on it and make sure you understand, as I am sure you do, how important the Trans-Pacific Partnership is to the

International Trade committee  Thank you. On behalf of Alberta Beef Producers, I thank you for the opportunity to make a presentation to you today. Being a somewhat uncommon second-generation Calgarian, I welcome you to Calgary today. A lot of what I will be saying I'm sure you will hear from others of our c

Environment committee  Because these are societal benefits, we need to find a way to engage society in paying for these benefits. That would take both the ability to measure, and that's a complex scientific challenge but one that's not insurmountable, combined with a framework of policy, markets, and a

Environment committee  You identified a very real challenge, in that there are often large-scale and specific initiatives that provide compensation for conservation. What we have generally lacked is a comprehensive system that provides compensation to a large number of what you suggest would be smaller

Environment committee  Thank you, Doug. I think Doug is maybe a little too modest about his speaking. I'm Rich Smith. I'm the executive director of Alberta Beef Producers. Doug Sawyer is the chair of our organization, and he's a cattle producer from near Red Deer. First of all, I would like to than