Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman and the committee. My name is Brian Otto and I am chairman of the Barley Council of Canada. I farm east of Warner, Alberta. I'd like to thank the committee for inviting me to present to you on behalf of the Barley Council of Canada. For those of you not

Agriculture committee  One thing I'd like to clarify is that the Barley Council of Canada is not a levy-funded organization. The Barley Council of Canada is made up of producer groups plus the industry. The producer groups and the industry are the ones that, as they become members of the Barley Council

Agriculture committee  It's all a matter of dollars and cents. Hang the carrot out there, and they'll grow the barley. That's what happened after 2008 when we were at 5.7 million acres. The malt industries realized that, if they were going to get farmers to grow barley for them, they had to offer pric

Agriculture committee  Farmers are very optimistic. What I'm hearing from the farmers I talk to is that we need trade, we need to export our product. Certainly, every agreement that we can sign in the world marketplace is good for Canadian agriculture.

Agriculture committee  I can't answer that. I think you would have to pose that question to the pork industry. Certainly, the Barley Council of Canada has the feed industry at our table, but it's not something that we have discussed at this time.

Agriculture committee  I have already stated that UPOV 91 does not threaten a farmer's ability to save his own seed. It doesn't. That's in the protocol. Where it does stop a farmer, and quite frankly, I support that you can't take that seed.... You're going to pay a royalty on it when you get it. I a

Agriculture committee  There might be the opportunity to do that, but again, I haven't looked that deeply into it. What you're talking about is probably end-point royalties.

Agriculture committee  I think what we have to look at is the state of our varietal development in Canada and the funding of it.

Agriculture committee  I think there are some opportunities, and Lisa can speak to this on the food side better than I can. Again, we're not talking beer because I call that the “liquid food” side of it. I don't know whether many people are aware of it, but there is barley flour available on the shelv

Agriculture committee  I can't answer that question. I don't know the answer. I can relate some stories. I have neighbours from that part of the world. One has farmed in Canada for 40 years now and said to me, “Brian, you would not believe the kind of barley they use to make beer over there.” He said t

Agriculture committee  Our quality is much better.

Agriculture committee  Yes.

Agriculture committee  I want to identify the question. You lost me.

Agriculture committee  The only way you could end up with low-level presence in barley is if a genetically modified seed accidentally got mixed in with barley. My experience in the barley industry is, if a customer wants a certain type of barley, certain specs, it's IP’d and segregated so that contami

Agriculture committee  Of course, if there's a demand for feed barley and that puts the bottom line in the farmer's pocket, you bet there's going to be more barley acres.