Agriculture committee  Absolutely, even if you look back two generations, when it came to weed control, you plowed the land, you tilled the land, you plowed the land. Any time you had a drought, you had soil and dust flying everywhere. I think when it comes to the realities, we need to make smart, se

Agriculture committee  Thank you for the invitation to appear. I'm filling in for our farmer chair, Mike Ammeter, who is down the road presiding over a board meeting as we speak. Global food insecurity is a complex, multi-faceted issue. It involves geopolitics, socio-economic factors and armed confli

Transport committee  I fully agree. It's integrated. We need trucks to get the grain from farm to elevator. We need the rail to get from elevator to port and then we need ships to be able to take it to the final destination. As far as what we should do goes, as your colleague Mr. Badawey said at the

Transport committee  We are concerned that there will be additional instability in the labour industry. As has been noted, it's not the date of stoppage; you start curtailing operations a week or so leading up to it. A week of downed rail capacity can mean a month to recover. I'll see if Steve has a

Transport committee  I'll start and then ask Steve weigh in. CP moves roughly 50% of all grain from the Prairies to the port of Vancouver. October, November and December are big months for moving grain, so that is certainly a concerning signal. I'll ask Steve if he has any more details as to the ca

Transport committee  I think the first would be the establishment of an industry-government labour council, as indicated in the report, with strong representation from agriculture. The second, before I ask my colleague Steve to weigh in, would be more timely data and transparency from the railways.

Transport committee  Thank you for the invitation to be here today. I'm joined virtually by my colleague Steve Pratte, senior manager, transportation and biofuel policy. CCGA is a national organization representing Canada's 43,000 canola farmers on issues and policies that impact on-farm profitabili

International Trade committee  I can't speak necessarily to the clean-tech side of it, Madam Chair. I can say, though, that when you are exporting something like a Canadian canola product, which is really good at sequestering carbon and does have recognition under the International Sustainability and Carbon C

International Trade committee  I would just say that it would really depend on the kind of commodity, where canola...it's all bulked up together. I'd also suggest that traceability comes with a significant cost. As we look at rising food prices, at the cost of living and inflation, we have to be really careful

International Trade committee  I can certainly say that in Canada, even, we're coming out of the worst drought in 50 years in western Canada. We saw production fall from about 20 million tonnes to about 12.5 million tonnes. I think the biggest thing with oilseeds around the world this year will be whether or n

International Trade committee  There are concerns around the perishability, just given that produce has such a short shelf life, and then the cost of refrigerating containers might make it cost prohibitive, but with root vegetables and things, it's probably an opportunity perhaps. That would be my take.

International Trade committee  I can start, and I'll ask Janelle to weigh in at a more detailed level. Farmers don't necessarily decide where their products end up. It's a bulk handling system. About 20 million tonnes get rolled up. When there isn't trade volatility, their prices tend to be higher, and they d

International Trade committee  I'll start and then pass it over to Janelle. The biggest markets that we're looking at within the Indo-Pacific region are Thailand and Vietnam, as well as Malaysia. One of the reasons that we look at it as such an opportunity is it is not only an economic opportunity, but also a

International Trade committee  To echo that, but in closing, I'd say it's about being proactive. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If we can get away from trade irritants before they become something, and have an expert on the ground who can walk local regulators through why it's not a concern a

International Trade committee  It's non-tariff trade barriers, one hundred per cent. Canola has a 90% export crop valued at $13.7 billion. It's not so much tariffs anymore; it's non-tariff trade barriers, the way they treat biotechnology, a lack of science-based equivalency and a lack of understanding phytosan