Agriculture committee  The issue I see right now is that, because of this COVID situation and the lack of certainty.... In farm businesses, we're comfortable with what we know. What we know is 85%. I think that ideally, long-term, there would be a better program. I think that's where some energy should

Agriculture committee  If that's directed towards me, I'll take a crack at it.

Agriculture committee  I think we have to be aware that all sectors have different needs and different ways that risk can be managed. Livestock is different from agriculture, which is different from horticulture. I think some of the focus that we need at NPAC, when we're talking about changes to progra

Agriculture committee  It's my hope that we don't run into this pandemic situation again and put the pressure on the business risk management programs as we're seeing right now. Because of this pressure and uncertainty, we as producers are looking at them and feeling uncomfortable about them, as I allu

Agriculture committee  To really answer that question, I would have to step back a little bit and give you a fairly political answer. We're really struggling with messaging from the government around cost neutrality. When we were given this task, both in the external advisory panel and within the natio

Agriculture committee  No, there are no limits in the U.S.

Agriculture committee  I think it speaks to Canada needing to have a clear, defined national agriculture and agri-food policy. Business risk management programs fit in that. I think there needs to be a broader discussion about how those assist producers and actually give us confidence within our domest

Agriculture committee  It would help. As Markus said, the margins in grains and oilseeds live in that area that was cut. I think the struggle you'd have would be marketing a program that's been changed. Too many farmers would think of AgriStability as AgriStability. Even if we changed it to be a real

Agriculture committee  Yes, I've taken advantage of the loan, and other friends of mine who farm have taken advantage of it if they fell within the parameters. With the changes that were introduced, more have been able to do that. I think the concern that some of us have is that, other than the $10,0

Agriculture committee  I think as we look forward, and if we really wanted to do some in-depth work within the impacted group and looked at different programs or created producer top-up of paid programs, some of that money from the producer side could come from AgriInvest. I would be quite willing to

Agriculture committee  In the letter we sent to ministers we asked to remove the reference margin limit in AgriStability. That was one thing that was brought forward. We understand the reason it was brought in, in the first place. There was no reason to protect profitability, but now that we're in a di

Agriculture committee  I can speak to my own experience. I use AgriInvest as a tool on our farm. I think we have seen some concerns around the account balances. We are using that as working capital on our farm. As soon as we get our matching deposit, we do a withdrawal. Right now my account balance in

Agriculture committee  Thank you. My name is Mark Brock and I'm the producer co-chair for the National Program Advisory Committee. I farm just outside of Hensall, Ontario, with my wife Sandi. We have a grain and oilseed operation and we also have sheep. I've had extensive industry involvement, but rig