Agriculture committee  The pulse sector, like every other ag sector, has had the opportunity to apply for science cluster money and a number of other programs. Are you interested more in the programs or the kind of work that we're focusing on?

Agriculture committee  Here's one area for improvement, and this was brought out from the universities. One of the considerations we can look at in Growing Forward 2 is using the current programming. You actually have to spend the money before you can apply to have some of it refunded. So if you have a

Agriculture committee  I'll talk about it from a primary agricultural and commodities perspective. We were behind the game in a lot of market access areas. We talked about Colombia. We ratified before the Americans did, but we would have been behind by a 15% tariff disadvantage. Right now in Morocco we

Agriculture committee  Some elements of rail performance have vastly improved. Other elements we'd like to see some improvement in. With regard to transit time variability from certain shipping points to port, we're still seeing some very highly variable transit times, which, in a very complex supply

Agriculture committee  Yes, there are elements that are a part of good business arrangement service level agreements. I think the role that Parliament can play is enhanced public sector reporting. One of the committees we have under the crop logistics working group is responsible for coming up with rec

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. It's always a pleasure and a privilege to be asked to appear before the standing committee to share some of Pulse Canada's thoughts, and today talk a little about Growing Forward 2 and what we believe—

Agriculture committee  Any strategy for agriculture needs to have a vision, and what I propose you consider is the vision we've laid out in the pulse industry, which is one that focuses on profitability. A focus on profitability says we have to get into a little more detail than just talking about meet

Agriculture committee  The point I wanted to make was that the marketplace we're serving--and I think Dr. Van Acker talked about this as well--has changed remarkably and will continue to change. We can't imagine where we'll be in 10 years. I think the mix between investments and innovation, and investm

Agriculture committee  I think that government should expect the whole system to work better. Government spent tens of billions of dollars in infrastructure improvement, and we should expect the entire supply chain to work better. I don't want to point fingers at the railway. We have people in our indu

Agriculture committee  If you're going to have a facilitator, you have to find a qualified person who can take the job, but I don't think that we need to wait. All things don't hinge on starting with a facilitator. There are other actions that we would all benefit from. What we need now is performance

Agriculture committee  That question might be better addressed to the provincial groups, the Ontario Coloured Bean Growers Association and the Ontario Bean Producers' Marketing Board. At Pulse Canada, we focus more on the market demand side rather than some of the production-specific areas. Frankly, I

Agriculture committee  On the first question about our position relative to Australia or the U.S., I don't think any exporting country would say they have the perfect transportation system. But one thing I do want to point out is the proximity to market. We have some of the longest shipping distances.

Agriculture committee  Beans are a good example. We do have some private investment. Thompsons has a breeding program, and a number of other private companies do. But what we look for is that private-public partnership that will extract the highest value. Dr. Van Acker talked about some mapping. So I t

Agriculture committee  Yes. A tremendous opportunity provided by the Canada-Colombia trade agreement for Canadians is that we have a 15% tariff advantage over another major supplier, the United States. The comment made at the meeting was that the 15% tariff advantage was tempered somewhat by the fact

Agriculture committee  Any of the things that limit our market access--and I talked about tariff barriers, non-tariff barriers, and transportation being the three key areas--ultimately detract from farmers' returns. If you have a 2.5% tariff disadvantage getting into Morocco and you want to sell there,