Human Resources committee  Well, I know in the farming industry that we have targeted some of the modern farm leaders, if you will, to give their narrative and their exposé on some of the things they do from top to bottom to manage their farms. We've taken that experience, for example, how they manage thei

Human Resources committee  Very quickly, in terms of the crossover between fisheries and farming in general, I want to point out that the aquaculture industry has membership in the Canadian agriculture sector council. They actually sit at our table, so we do represent the HR issues in the aquaculture indus

Human Resources committee  I think there's a fairly wide variance across all commodities and all sectors as to exactly where that lies. There is, of course, the issue of low skills, and we have programs in the foreign worker program to address that. But there are medium to high skills as well. Some of the—

Human Resources committee  Yes, I was getting to it, actually. It has been machinery operators, for example. The variance in the machine industry, depending on the commodity, can mean a lot of different things. In horticulture, it comes down to actually using the machinery for the picking of the crop, if y

Human Resources committee  Yes, we have, to a degree, but in our quest to get that basic database, that labour market information, we did two significant studies. One was on farms greater than $100,000 income per year. We did another significant study on farms less than $100,000, which represent, by the wa

Human Resources committee  Okay, thanks. I thought you were going to mention that I'm talking too fast. I have a tendency to do that sometimes. If I could just recap, there are 300,000, approximately, farming enterprises. Each one of these enterprises has a number of employees, which also totals approxima

Human Resources committee  Yes, the deficit is unemployed, yes.

Human Resources committee  The numbers tell us that.... Let me check here. I think 62% of the workers who are out there across the country are seasonal workers, part-time workers. Not quite 40% would be full-time. Understanding the variation of the seasons, if you're in the horticulture industry, which is

Human Resources committee  I would square it with your comments. If your comments are accurate, praise the Lord, because up to this point I haven't seen it. We have, as agriculture producers, some of it through our organization, CAHRC, been talking about these issues around the bureaucracy that's involved

Human Resources committee  No, I'm absolutely not against that. I encourage my employees all the time to do what's best for them. What I'm saying is that in the process of these people getting full-time jobs there is a loss. Again, we're getting into the nuances of the EI program. I'm not saying this pro

Human Resources committee  I'll be very quick. I liked the pun. You know, I wouldn't want to say that we're for or against them. It's too premature. All I would say is that we would want to raise the flag on that, and we would need more consultation. It creates a level of uncertainty. We just simply don

Human Resources committee  I won't exacerbate that. I'll just say it's there. It's an underlying current we need to appreciate and understand within the scope of labour and skills. Other than the fact that I would want to, at this stage, highlight it, I wouldn't want to commit to good, bad, or otherwise.

Human Resources committee  It's 300,000.

Human Resources committee  That's all-encompassing. Our membership...our board of directors is made up of a director from each province of Canada, as well as each territory, as well as various leading commodity groups within Canada. For example, the president of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture is act

Human Resources committee  If you want to look at the 10% deficit that I talked about, the jobs and the shortfalls, that would be 600,000, because the total numbers are 300,000 enterprises, approximately. We have the exact numbers. Approximately—