THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE AND FORESTRY
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Tuesday, September 26, 2017
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 5:40 p.m. to study the potential impact of the effects of climate change on the agriculture, agri-food and forestry sectors.
Senator Ghislain Maltais (Chair) in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: Good afternoon, colleagues.
[English]
Good afternoon to our guests. Today the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry is continuing its study on the potential impact of the effects of climate change on the agriculture, agri-food and forestry sectors.
My name is Senator Maltais. I am the chair of this committee. Before continuing, I will ask senators to introduce themselves, beginning with Senator Mercer.
Senator Mercer: I’m Senator Terry Mercer from Nova Scotia. I am the deputy chair of the committee.
[Translation]
Senator Tardif: Claudette Tardif from the province of Alberta.
Senator Gagné: Raymonde Gagné from the province of Manitoba.
Senator Petitclerc: Senator Chantal Petitclerc from Quebec.
Senator Pratte: Senator André Pratte from Quebec.
[English]
Senator Doyle: Norman Doyle, Newfoundland and Labrador.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Jean-Guy Dagenais from the province of Quebec.
[English]
Senator Ogilvie: Kelvin Ogilvie, Nova Scotia.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you, senators. Today, we have with us Genevieve Grossenbacher, Program Manager, Policy and Campaigns at USC Canada, and Martin Entz, Professor at the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at the University of Manitoba. From USC Canada, we also have Faris Ahmed, Director of Policy and Campaigns, and Martin Settle, Executive Director.
Before getting started, I would like to know what USC Canada stands for and what it means.
[English]
Martin Settle, Executive Director, USC Canada: I will say a little bit about that as we go. We were founded in 1945 as the Unitarian Service Committee by Lotta Hitschmanova and have 72 years of experience working in international development and also working here in Canada.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you. Is it Ms. Grossenbacher who will be starting?
Genevieve Grossenbacher, Program Manager, Policy and Campaigns, USC Canada: Actually, Martin Settle will speak first and then I will continue.
The Chair: Please go ahead.
[English]
Mr. Settle: Honourable senators, staff and guests, it is a pleasure to be invited to speak to you today about the potential impacts of climate change on agriculture. I am Martin Settle, Executive Director of USC Canada, and I am joined by Faris Ahmed, who is our Director of Policy and Campaigns; Genevieve Grossenbacher, who is our Manager of Policy and Campaigns and herself a diversified organic vegetable producer in the Gatineau region; and Dr. Martin Entz, a colleague from the University of Manitoba.
USC Canada is a Canadian success story. We were founded in 1945, as I mentioned, by Lotta Hitschmanova as the Unitarian Service Committee, but since 1989, we have worked increasingly and eventually exclusively with farmers at the forefront of climate change adaptation and mitigation. Our Seeds of Survival international program works with agricultural communities in marginal ecological regions to increase the genetic diversity needed to maintain food production in rapidly and unpredictably changing conditions.
Over the last 10 years alone, partnering with the Canadian government, USC Canada has invested over $35 million public and charity dollars in agricultural biodiversity programming overseas, making us one of the global leaders in this field. Since 2012, we have applied our extensive international experience to working with farmers in Canada. This Canadian program was made possible through the visionary support of the W. Garfield Weston Foundation. With the Weston contribution, we have invested an additional $7 million in agricultural biodiversity in Canada.
In addition, we are engaged at the Committee on World Food Security, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture and the Convention on Biological Diversity.
Our work in the fields with farmers informs the message we take to those bodies and the message that we bring to you today. I look forward to our conversations and to the continued support of the Government of Canada in USC Canada’s work, securing the resources needed for our future food production.
I am happy to answer any questions later about USC Canada and our work, but in the meantime, I hand you over to the real experts in this field, my colleagues Genevieve and Dr. Entz.
[Translation]
Ms. Grossenbacher: I realize that I should have done my presentation in French. I am sorry. Since I prepared my notes in English, I will do my presentation in English and I know that you have excellent interpreters.
[English]
Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and honourable senators of the committee. Thank you for inviting us today to talk about the impacts of climate change on agriculture.
We really want to talk to you today about three things: first, the role of ecological agriculture in building climate resilience; second, the need for a carbon pricing system to include programs that incentivize best practices to build climate resilience; and third, we want to talk a bit more about recommendations on what Canada could do at the federal and provincial levels to support the adoption of more sustainable practices in Canada and also abroad.
But first, how does agriculture relate to climate resilience? I want to start by saying that agriculture, as we all know and as the Barton Report highlighted, represents a huge part of our economy. One in eight jobs come from the agriculture and food sector and it contributes 6.7 per cent of the GDP. Two thirds of that goes to support our domestic market.
Canada’s prosperity really depends on a vibrant and dynamic agricultural sector. However, as we have seen with climate change, especially in recent years — this year is a good example where we have had severe floods and droughts across the country. We see how vulnerable our food system is. Part of the reason is that globally we have lost 75 per cent of the agricultural biodiversity in the last 100 years. Seventy-five per cent of the world’s food is derived from only 12 plants and five species.
Biodiversity is a most important ecological practice yet is at risk right now. Because of that, in many regions of the world, including in Canada, agricultural productivity is approaching a plateau, while the monoculture systems that dominate our current practices are not resilient to climate stress, as we have seen this year, for instance. Combined, these two vulnerabilities create a direct risk to our food system.
The good news is that solutions already exist around the world. As highlighted in one of the reports that I have here — a few copies in French and English — from the IPES, International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems, there is numerous evidence that diversified agri-ecological systems are succeeding where other current systems are failing, performing really well, especially under environmental stresses. We have seen this in the field in the countries we work with. As Marty mentioned, we work in 12 countries around the world, including Canada.
For instance, since 1998, Honduras has been hit hard with hurricanes, and we have seen that again this year. In response, the farmers we work with in the mountains, in collaboration with the University of Guelph, have bred and released several varieties of maize that are high yielding and more resilient to climate change. They’ve bred different varieties that are locally adapted from indigenous sources. They bred them, and together what happened is they got corn that had larger cobs that are adapted well to high altitude and that don’t blow over or are not damaged by the winds and the rains of a hurricane.
The results have been impressive, including this year. For example, as you know, this was one of the worst years for hurricanes in Honduras; many people had nothing to harvest or sow for the coming season, but communities where they grew the maize that they adapted were hardly affected. The days of hunger, or what is referred to as los Hunos, the number of weeks in June that people go hungry, have gone down in a few years from 5.73 weeks to fewer than 1.63 weeks in the communities where we work, largely because of the quality, adaptability and resilience built into those seeds. So seed diversity and having seeds that are heterogenous is really important.
Similar results have been happening in Canada. Dr. Entz can talk to that work. We conducted research at the University of Manitoba with AAFC and USC Canada as partners for the past six years. For the first time in recent history, farmers are engaging directly in the plant breeding process to develop crops that are climate resilient. Martin Entz will talk more about this later.
Investing in seed diversity, on-farm breeding with farmers, is important, especially through research and development, participatory plant breeding and knowledge transfer. It is not the only thing we must do, but it is definitely one thing we need to do, and soon.
I would now like to turn it over to Dr. Martin Entz to talk about what types of farm-level practices contribute the most to our climate resilience and what Canada can do to become a world leader in those spheres.
Martin Entz, Professor, Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences, University of Manitoba, as an individual: Good afternoon, senators. It is a pleasure to be here.
I am a professor at the University of Manitoba. I have a Ph.D. in drought physiology from the University of Saskatchewan and have worked in Australia on drought-based systems. It is my background. I have been an agronomist for many decades, trying to make agriculture more resilient. Over my career, I have seen challenges and I have seen the potential that an ecological technology has to offer. I wanted to share four short stories about that. I think you will be getting a PowerPoint at some point, which we prepared to illustrate this. I guess that will follow.
When we look at agriculture as an economic engine in our country, we count on increasing productivity. Indeed, Canadian agriculture remains on the upward slope. We see yields increasing every year. They are starting to plateau a bit. There is still room to move, and that is good news. There are some countries where yields have not only plateaued but have also decreased. Surprisingly, it is Australia. Over the last 15 years, Australian wheat yields have decreased close to 10 per cent. As CSIRO has documented, this is a result of declining precipitation in that country over the 20-year period and increasing temperatures.
This is the first signal from an industrialized country that climate change is reducing yield potential. The rains may come back, but high temperatures cause pollination problems in crops like wheat and reduce its yield potential.
When I look at things like that, it makes me reflect on what we are doing in this country to mitigate that. I am from the Prairies and I will talk about no-till agriculture. It has been a roaring success in Canada. We are not only leaders in developing the technology, but we export the technology around the world. We export the machines and the know-how. Even our no-till farmers have seen that it is not sequestering carbon the way they’d like. We thought it would sequester carbon, but it is only doing that at the surface layer and that carbon is not always stable.
What is exciting is that these no-till farmers are now starting to incorporate ecological practices. In the PowerPoint that you will receive, there is a video from Colin Rosengren in Midale, Saskatchewan who is intercropping on his 4,000-acre no-till farm. Those words may not mean that much to the average Canadian but, to distil it down, it is applying ecology on a large “industrial” farm. It has helped stabilize yields and has made his system more climate resilient.
I call them ecological technologies, and we see ecological technologies moving in the mainstream of Canadian agriculture and being embraced by large farmers and they are very important.
The third point is organic farming. A lot of people are interested in what organic agriculture can do for Canadian agriculture. We at the University of Manitoba have the oldest organic research program in Canada. We have been at it for 26 years. Come visit our Glenlea plot when you are close to Winnipeg some time; I would love to host you.
We have learned so much by doing research in organic agriculture that we are now applying to all agriculture. One of the exciting programs is that we have engaged farmers in breeding varieties for organic production. That is where our partnership with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and USC Canada has blossomed. We currently work with 77 farmers from Vancouver Island to P.E.I. with wheat, oats and potatoes. This is the first time in recent Canadian history, since Seager Wheeler in Saskatchewan, that farmers are invited into the breeding process. We work out the intellectual property with them. We will make more climate-resistant crops. We have already established that.
The final point I wanted to make is on the carbon tax. I am not an economist but I know one of the realities is that, in Canada, the only terrestrial sink for carbon is the soil. That is the only place where we can put carbon if we plan on sequestering it. My colleagues and I who are agronomists feel that revenue from a carbon tax should be used to help farmers sequester carbon in our soils in an ecological way. It can and will work, and it’s the only place for the carbon to go. Thank you for your time.
Ms. Grossenbacher: I know we have run past, but may I do my concluding thoughts?
Talking about carbon pricing, for us at USC Canada, it is outside of our expertise because the farmers we work with tend to be on the low carbon omission end of the spectrum. That being said — and we agree with what Martin said — we think it is important for a carbon pricing mechanism to include programs that would incentivize the adoption of this practice. It is important that it is not a punitive system but a system that rewards farmers.
In France, they have had huge successes in supporting agriculture. In Quebec, great work is being done now with legislation that was adopted under Growing Forward 2. Now the province is better supporting organic agriculture and we have seen the results, a 300 per cent increase in ecological production. There is a school that has 750 applications for people who want to start in ecological agriculture.
That’s all to say that France was telling me that to work, such systems, like reward programs, need to be based on the fact that farmers replicate what they see works and what they can get financial support for. It is important that we support this type of reward program.
In terms of recommendations and policies, I think we can get more into those in the question period. Basically, the message is if we want to match the productivity ambitions that we have and at the same time reduce the environmental footprint of our agricultural system, which currently produces 10.3 per cent of our greenhouse gas emissions, we need to accompany farmers to adopt more practices and support them through the whole process. Knowledge sharing, research, investment in research and development and knowledge transfer are key.
Sustainable agriculture delivers on multiple fronts and it delivers not just to organic farmers but to all farmers. The reverse is not always true. Seeds that are developed to perform well in organic systems don’t require much input to grow. These seeds can actually be used on conventional farms.
In addition, for increasing climate resilience, ecological systems help preserve biodiversity. Studies have shown that organic or ecological farms are two or three times more efficient at preserving biodiversity. They improve farm viability. A great study was released this spring showing that organic farms can improve farm profitability by 35 per cent and increase farm employment. I visited a farm yesterday on 6.5 acres in Quebec. On six acres, they employ 20 people. This is incredible for the community. There is also investment in local economy. In Quebec, for instance, if every person put $20 a week toward local food, 100,000 jobs would be created.
Ecological agriculture benefits on multiple fronts can help the entire economy. However, it has succeeded despite the funding it has received. We have a graph that shows in 2015, $649.5 million was invested in research and development in agriculture in Canada. Of that $649.5 million, only $1.6 million went to organic agriculture. That is 0.25 per cent of the whole R&D. We know the organic market is only 2 per cent of the market, but it is one of the fastest growing economies. It has tripled since 2006 and it is in full bloom in Quebec. It just needs more support.
The great news is that Canada has lots of opportunities to invest in ecological agriculture. The national food policy is in development. It’s a food policy for Canada, and it’s a great time to actually support the adoption of more sustainable practices through the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, Growing Forward 3, if you will.
There are lots of ways that we can, through the business risk management, make sure to adapt them. Right now, the big problem with the next policy framework is that, in the past, a lot of programs are designed to disincentivize diversification. To say it differently, as a small-scale diversified farmer, a lot of the programs just don’t apply to me. Yet, as a farmer, when I grow, for instance, 35 crops on my field, that’s a risk. Fortunately, it helps me to be more resilient, but I also need support. Right now, the programs are not designed for that. That’s something that they can change.
A lot of money under the environmental/climate change pillar of the next agriculture partnership and a lot of programs could help support knowledge transfer, and research and development in agriculture.
Through the Canadian international aid and assistance, it’s important also that Canada invest in making sure that they support ecological practices abroad. Germany has just changed their aid assistance to make sure that whenever they invest money abroad in agriculture, they make sure to prioritize organic agriculture. Canada would be in a place to do the same. We know that agriculture —agro-ecology — is really a great way to reach women, to empower them and improve their livelihood.
I went a bit longer than I’d planned. I’m sorry for that, but if there are only two things you must remember from our presentation, the first is that ecological agriculture provides benefits on multiple fronts, and imagine what it could do with more. It doesn’t need to take much time. We’ve seen great success in France, Brazil, Quebec and Cuba. Over a short amount of time, a lot of successes can happen, and that’s really the way to build our resilience.
When I say “ecological agriculture,” what is important in terms of climate change is investing in seed diversity and making sure we don’t lose that. It’s our best insurance against climate change.
On that note, we look forward to your questions.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Before we begin the question period, I would like to introduce two senators who have just joined us: Senator Bernard from Nova Scotia, and Senator Woo from British Columbia. Senator Woo has just been named coordinator of the Independent Senators Group. Many senators wish to ask you questions and we have 56 minutes left. Therefore, I would ask you to make your questions and your answers brief.
[English]
Senator Mercer: First of all, before I came to the Senate, I was a professional fundraiser for about 40 years. Lotta Hitschmanova was a visionary in that field. There are those of us who are old enough to remember her raising money through television ads before anybody else ever was. She was a groundbreaker and did wonderful work. On 56 Sparks Street, we all remember that was the message.
This is a very interesting presentation and I wish we had the PowerPoint. I assumed from what I read, although you didn’t say it, that none of the products we’re talking about are genetically modified. And no-till farming has become very popular.
I continue to go back to this question with almost all of our witnesses —9.7 billion people on the planet we’re going to have shortly. Nobody has designed a plan as to how we’re going to feed those people. If we don’t feed them, we are going to be very angry people, and angry people have no choice but to try to find a way to eat, which leads to conflicts, war, et cetera.
How do we take what you have learned — number one, using it in Canada is an important thing to increase production here so that we have more food to export — but how do we export the technology that we’ve learned to countries to grow their own food and to be more efficient? We know that in India, for example, they grow enough food to feed themselves, but they can’t store it or deliver it to their customers in a fashion that is 100 per cent usable. There is a lot of wastage. Help us here.
Faris Ahmed, Director of Policy and Campaigns, USC Canada: Thank you, Senator Mercer. Good to see you again. It’s the question, isn’t it — the 9.7 billion people — how are we going to feed them? We need to almost think about this question in a different way. What kind of system, we could argue, is the most efficient and effective in feeding people in the long term?
It is true that populations are increasing, but it’s also true that the kind of smallholder farmers that we work with — the kind that Genevieve and Martin describe — are producing food in an efficient way and are working with long-term resilience of food systems. Seventy per cent of the world’s food is grown by those farmers in less than two hectares. Small but diverse plots of lands are already performing at an incredible and quite a dynamic way. We need to invest more in these farmers — support them — and also try to take away things that hamper them, whether it’s investments that take away their land or other such things.
Another part of the equation is to look at food waste. We know that a third of the food that is produced from fields all the way to fork and beyond, whether it’s processing or decombustion, is also wasted.
If you look at the whole picture of the food system, there are many things we can do at each stage that are going to offer lots of innovation, allow us to switch the question and look at who is already feeding the world and we can support them.
When we came to visit you, we brought this fantastic report done by a food systems agency. They’re called the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems. They outlined a map of looking at how food systems can transition to answer exactly the question that you have.
Mr. Entz: I want to respond as well. You raise a great question. Vaclav Smil, a University of Manitoba scholar, argues that there are already enough calories in the world to feed 9 billion. But the distribution, of course, is an issue, and it’s the distribution of wealth. Our work in Zimbabwe has been quite amazing. We actually took the type of agriculture that Colin Rosengren is practising in Midale, Saskatchewan, and supported a traditional practice by intercropping pigeon pea and other things with maize, and using mulches. Significant increases in yield — doubling, tripling.
The principles that we’re talking about here are using nature’s processes in addition to the social fabric and circumstances — paying attention to those things — are how we are going to feed ourselves.
While there is a lot of local food production where people live, Canada will remain a food exporter. Japan — there are countries in the world that simply cannot produce enough food for themselves. But it is even in our best interest to practise these ecological methods.
Senator Mercer: Would you not agree that there are only a few countries in the world that can produce more arable land to put in agriculture, Canada being one of them? It means the one good thing about global warming is that our farms can move a little farther north than we traditionally have.
The frustration I have is that we have this problem, we know what some of the solutions are, and some of the stuff you talked about are part of those solutions, but absolutely nobody is planning this. There is no global summit about sitting down and saying how we’re going to feed 9.7 billion people.
Mr. Entz: Let’s organize one. They actually do exist.
I wanted to make one other point: The fact that we’re talking more about agriculture globally is important, especially in this country, as is investing in smallholder farmers in terms of education, empowering women and giving access to land. I think it’s a very hopeful future, but we have to get it right.
Senator Doyle: Looking at the briefing notes, I get the impression that you view the smaller, mixed farm as being more user-friendly to the environment. You have a lower carbon footprint and, as a result, you promote greater biodiversity.What about the rotation of crops? What part would that play in all of that, say, rotation of crops from year to year? Is it economically sound to do that on the smaller farm?
Ms. Grossenbacher: It’s a very good question. I realize that I maybe didn’t make it explicit.
We believe there are different models of how to secure food future. One model that is not getting attention, which we’re talking about, is ecological agriculture. Ecological agriculture takes different forms across the country. We have a wide and diverse country. In Quebec, some of the best successes of ecological agriculture are definitely, I would say, coming through the small-scale diversified vegetable producers. There are many cases coming out showing that not only do they deliver in terms of the environment, but they also deliver financially. Again, the farm I was just visiting, on six acres, nets $800,000. Most of the corn farmers — my neighbours, who are conventional — do $350 per acre on a good year. So we’re not talking at all about the same level of production. They are high-intensive. That’s one model.
In the Prairies, with no-till agriculture — and Martin can answer more of that — the best practices are coming from there. There are a lot of practices.
The good thing is that we have seen different models and different types of agriculture, whether it’s vegetable, corn or cereal production. We’ve seen good practices. The farmers who really work at reducing their footprint don’t use synthetic fertilizers. That’s the main culprit, as far as I understand, of greenhouse gas emissions. Being organic and reducing their pesticide use is extremely important.
Second, they use a combination of usually at least eight different techniques. Crop rotation is definitely one of those, but all techniques that work at building the soil help, so long-term crop rotation, using green manure and diversifying the crops.
On my farm we do 35, but on successful cereal farms, even if they have four or five crops, that’s a big net improvement on having only two to rely on.
Mr. Entz: Crop rotation is so important. It’s been documented since the Romans, and probably before. In Canada, we have embraced crop rotation. We need to do it better. It is really a form of diversification. We call it diversification in time: one year you grow this crop, the next year this one.
We want to build on crop rotation to also build diversity and space — not outer space, but spatially across the landscape. It is exciting; the Canola Council of Canada has documented that hedgerows in canola fields actually result in an increase in the canola yield right near the hedgerow because there’s more pollinator activity. That’s an example of spatial diversity.
I am so hopeful that, for the first time since the 1920s, we’re seeing an increase in farmers in Canada. These young farmers — entrepreneurial, peri-urban — really have to embrace diversity; otherwise it won’t function.
One final point: If we look at many small holders in Eastern and Southern Africa, they don’t have enough land to do the type of crop rotation that we’re used to in Nova Scotia or Manitoba. They will always grow maize because it’s their staple. The way to introduce diversity there is to intercrop legumes with them.
I really like your topic. When you think about rotation, think about diversity. It’s a form of diversity.
Senator Doyle: The frequency of crop rotation would be dependent upon the crop that you’re growing?
Mr. Entz: It is dependent on the economics of how much those crops pay, and there’s always a tendency to grow the one that’s the most economical.
A lot of Canadian farmers would have five, six crops in their rotation. If you look at the small-scale farmers, like Genevieve says, some have 12, up to 35. There’s tremendous diversity.
[Translation]
The Chair: We have 14 minutes left and seven senators have asked to speak. Please make your questions and your answers brief.
[English]
Senator Woo: Very quickly, I want to ask about zero-till farming and your suggestion that the revenues from carbon taxes be used to encourage zero-till and other kinds of practices that increase yield but also reduce carbon footprint.Something we heard from many farmers and farming groups was that they are already sort of maxed out on zero till. Everybody does it already and there’s not much more to do. Could you comment on that?
Could you also comment a bit more on what you said about the limited benefits of zero till per se because it’s only the top layer and the other things that need to be done together with zero till in order to further improve the sequestration benefits of that practice?
Mr. Entz: Canadian studies have shown that in Western Canada there is some sequestration of carbon with no-till in the wetter areas of Eastern Canada. It’s not very stable.The way to improve carbon sequestration of no-till is to use what we call “cover crops,” to actually grow plants during those shoulder periods, after the crop is harvested. One thing we now know is that it’s the roots of plants that really help stabilize carbon in soil.
The final point is that no-till is practised mostly with annual crops, which have relatively shallow roots and actually quite short growing cycles. When we can include perennials in the rotation, that is a game changer. Use of perennials and cover crops is the way we’ll leverage no-till to sequester new amounts of carbon, deeper in the profile.
Senator Woo: The point is that there is much room for expansion of zero till in order to gain more benefits of sequestration; we haven’t exhausted the possibilities?
Mr. Entz: Tony Vyn, at the University of Guelph, did a study years ago, asking: Is it zero-tillage or plant diversity that allows you to improve soil? Plant diversity is more important than zero tillage. The good news is we can do it in all systems.
[Translation]
The Chair: I’m going to ask senators to limit themselves to one question each, otherwise we will run out of time.
Senator Dagenais: I would like to thank our guests. You are recommending changes to agricultural practices. Ms. Grossenbacher, as you mentioned, in Quebec, this has been a success. I thought you were talking about taxes in Quebec since we pay a lot of taxes, which is also another success.
What is the difference between smaller countries like Honduras and a country as large as Canada, where considerable efforts are being made to implement new agricultural practices? Could you explain that in detail? I imagine there is a discernable difference between small and big countries. Could you tell us about it in greater detail?
Ms. Grossenbacher: That is an excellent question.
It comes back a little to what Martin was saying earlier. No matter what the practices are, or whether the country is small or big, there is a need for increased biodiversity. Industry understands this reality, but countries have not yet made the necessary efforts to preserve diversity. In Canada, for example, a lot of importance has been placed on the need to safeguard seed diversity in banks located off the farm. That is important, but it is even more important to promote on-the-farm diversity. On-the-farm diversity is like having money in your pocket; in a crisis, you have access to that money. Currently, there is a lack of investment in that model, and that is what is needed.
I am not sure if that answers your question.
Senator Dagenais: That is a great answer. A short answer to a short question, that is very efficient.
[English]
Senator Ogilvie: Ms. Grossenbacher, you referred briefly to carbon tax during your presentation, and I got the impression you were favourable towards the use of a carbon tax. But not all provinces are thinking about that.In fact, it’s recently been reported that Quebec and Ontario may form some sort of consortium with California with regard to cap and trade. How would you see cap and trade in comparison to a carbon tax in terms of its positive or negative impact on agriculture?
Ms. Grossenbacher: Actually, I wonder if someone else might want to take that question. At USC, we don’t have a hugely formed position on this issue because, as I said, the farmers we work with don’t emit carbon. We’re favourable to different mechanisms. What we want to make sure of is that the farmers are not further impeded or be subject to more costs by following the system. We want to make sure we protect farmland in food production.
That being said, I really do think that there are different models out there, but I’m not the best person to tell you which one.
[Translation]
Senator Tardif: Thank you for your presentation. I find it unfortunate that the funding for organic agriculture research was 0.25 per cent of the overall amount invested in agricultural research and development. That is pathetic.
You recommend a food policy for Canada. What connection do you make between the types of ecological agriculture practices that you are advocating and this food policy that you propose for Canada?
Ms. Grossenbacher: We are actually writing a short document that summarizes our recommendations to the government about the measures to be taken as part of the food policy for Canada. This food policy covers the conservation of natural resources, water, soil and biodiversity, how to increase our production, and also access to food. For us, the first two pillars that I mentioned are mainly where Canada can do a number of things.
Regarding the conservation of our resources, I was talking about the importance of safeguarding diversity. Canada has obligations at the international level, as a signatory to the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. Canada is a signatory to that treaty, but we have not invested in safeguarding our biodiversity, and that is something specific that we can do.
On the matter of protecting farms and agricultural land, you produced a very good report on the disappearance of farm land. We do not have much of it. We are losing farms at an incredible rate. Young people want to start a career in agriculture, but they do not have access to it. Could the federal government create programs that would lead the provinces to protect their farmland? It is important.
We have a number of other recommendations, and I will be happy to send you our final document.
Senator Gagné: You have answered my question.
[English]
Senator Bernard: My apologies for being late; thank you for your presentation. As you know, I met with you back in the spring, and I really like the work you are doing with USC Canada.
I have a two-part question, if I’m allowed.
[Translation]
The Chair: Within the same question.
[English]
Senator Bernard: With organic farming, one of the issues that often comes up is accessibility. People often don’t have access, either because they’re living in rural or remote communities and organic farms are just not available to them, and I certainly see this a lot in Nova Scotia, or they are in low-income communities and they can’t afford it. I’d like you to talk how a national strategy may reach those who would not have access.
Here is where I’ll get the other point in. Let’s tie that to the work you’re supporting in Toronto at the Black Creek Farm. I had the privilege of visiting there this summer and I was absolutely impressed with what they’re doing. For my colleagues who don’t know about it, it’s an urban farm in a very dense area in Toronto near Jane and Finch, and they are doing amazing work. The sense I had from my visit there is that they were very under-resourced but that there’s a lot of community engagement.
How can a national strategy look at bridging those gaps that we see around accessibility? And is Black Creek an example?
Ms. Grossenbacher: What an excellent question. I’ll try to be brief. The kicker is that, as you said, there’s already so much work being done across the country — things like Black Creek Farm in Toronto or the work that we do in the Prairies. However, that work is virtually not supported, so we definitely need to support it, for sure.
In terms of making food accessible, I think one thing we can definitely do, also as part of the recommendations for the national food policy, is invest in developing a right-to-food strategy. Olivier De Schutter had come to Canada to suggest we do that, but there are more and more people and experts around the world who are saying we need to talk about right-to-food in Canada and also abroad.
In terms of access to food, there are so many good examples of countries across the world who have invested, for instance, in making sure that institutional procurement is sourced from local organic farms or farms using sustainable practices, for instance, making sure that at school or at the hospital, you have access to food that is healthy for you, but we need to invest in that.
[Translation]
Senator Gagné: The question is the following: is Canada in a position to meet the global demand? The number of farms is increasing, and more and more small farms are reappearing in the industry.
I am thinking of the North, and how we could start to invest to help the communities located there. Do you have projects you could describe that would let us appreciate the work being done in that region?
Ms. Grossenbacher: Excellent question.
[English]
Mr. Settle: The answer might be a little strong, but one of the things that USC Canada would note is that in terms of both agriculture and the economy, diversity is important. We would never propose that Canada is looking at a system where all farms become small mixed farms because that doesn’t work in lots of parts of the Prairies, but we need to look at a diversity of options wherever we are.
However, we do believe that the more local we can look at production, the more we can reduce transport and the more nutrient gets captured in the food, the better the food is. One of the challenges for Canada that our Canadian program has been trying to address is the lack of locally adapted seed.
Seed that we get in Canada primarily is either grown under conditions in which there are high inputs and the seed then requires those inputs to be able to grow to the same level, or it’s imported. If it’s imported, it’s not adapted to our environment. Once again, we either have low yield or we have to add input.
Whether it’s in the Far North or whether it’s in the Prairies, whether it’s in P.E.I., Vancouver or in the Fraser Valley, we need to be looking at adapting seed to those ecological regions. It’s not that we can have Canadian seed because Canada itself, as you mentioned, is diverse, so the solutions have to be local.
Our Bauta program is working already in the North and we would be happy to share more about that.
Senator Petitclerc: Part of my question has been answered already, but maybe to have it on the record, I think everybody understands how ecological or biofarming has less impact on the planet. That’s easy to understand.
The more conventional agriculture sector will keep saying is that this is a niche market, it will stay a niche market and it is not sustainable on a larger scale. In other words, we can’t feed the country with organic farming. I want to have your opinion on that. How realistic would that be? How ambitious could we be if we chose, as a society, to do that?
Ms. Grossenbacher: I love that question. There is no easy answer. How much more can we do? We can do lots more. That is the thing. Perhaps I didn’t stress it enough, but organic agriculture and the progress coming out of that does not only benefit organic agriculture. Things like crop rotation and no tillage and a lot of those practices have come out of organic agriculture and have been applied successfully to other farms.
We are not trying to create a paradigm that this agriculture is good and this is bad. We are all in the same boat here. We all need to reduce our environmental footprint and, to get there, we need to make some serious changes in how we produce food. We have a lot to offer as organic agriculture but also as ecological agriculture. We just need to invest to make that happen.
Mr. Entz: To add to that, I think that is a great question.
The nice thing about investing — at least something in a different paradigm, whether it is integrated health or agriculture — is that you will stimulate new businesses and new ideas. Every day I interact with small companies who are developing ecological technologies that are quickly used by the mainstream.
I don’t agree with the standard agri-business that this is a niche. I think it is an evolving situation. For example, Monsanto, one of the biggest agri-businesses in the world, sells inoculants for organic production now. They see the writing on the wall. We have small companies in the Maritimes that are developing biologicals from compost, and they have microbiologists in their small labs identifying what those microbes do for specific uses. I reject that argument.
Over time, I think we will see this continually evolve. It is a bit like integrated medicine. That is the best analogy I have, and it works. You have a little bit of both, a bit of art and a bit of science.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you, Senator Petitclerc, as well as our four witnesses for their excellent testimony. We could have spent the whole day asking you questions. Unfortunately, our time is limited.
Earlier, you mentioned a document you could send us on health and organic agriculture. Could I ask you to send it to our clerk? Then we can read it and use it to write our report. I would also like to thank you for having traveled here.
We now welcome our new witnesses. Welcome to the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry. We are continuing our study on the potential impact of the effects of climate change on the agriculture, agri-food and forestry sectors. You are the first foresters to appear before the committee on this subject. We welcome Fred Pinto, Past President of the Canadian Institute of Forestry; Jonathan Lok, also Past President of the Canadian Institute of Forestry; Dana Collins, Executive Director of the Canadian Institute of Forestry; and Anne Koven, Adjunct Professor at the University of Toronto.
I would ask you to present your opening comments quickly and to keep your answers short. I would also ask senators to limit themselves to one question each. If we have time left, we can have a second round of questions. You have the floor.
[English]
Dana Collins, Executive Director, Canadian Institute of Forestry: Thank you for inviting us to speak here on one of the most timely and topical themes facing not just our generation now but future generations to come.
To give you a brief introduction of who we are and what we will be speaking about today, we are here representing the Canadian Institute of Forestry. I am the executive director, and Fred Pinto is the past president but also the Executive Director of the Ontario Professional Foresters Association. Dr. Anne Koven is a member at large and also an adjunct professor in the Faculty of Forestry at the University of Toronto. John Lok is the immediate past president of the Canadian Institute of Forestry, as well as the CEO of Strategic Natural Resource Consultants on Vancouver Island. He’s also two-time past president of the Association of BC Forest Professionals.
The Canadian Institute of Forestry is the oldest forest society within Canada. We are 109 years old. We represent forest practitioners across the entire country. It is important to note this is not just forest industry; it is government, academia and not-for-profits. We mirror the diversity of those who work within the forestry sector.
Generally speaking, on a day-to-day basis, our mandate is threefold: education and awareness within the public sphere; competency training for forestry practitioners across Canada, and it’s also advocacy and speaking out on behalf of sustainable forest management within Canada and abroad.
I also want to mention that this is a timely time to be speaking. Canada is celebrating National Forest Week this week, so happy National Forest Week to everyone.
I want to give a quick introduction on how forests interact in this larger conversation about climate, carbon and climate change. First, how do our forests interact with carbon and climate change? It is important to note that Canada is a forest nation. We have 348 million hectares of forested area across Canada. This amounts to about 9 per cent of the global forest cover. There really is a due diligence among our forest sector to manage these forests sustainably, not just for the benefit of Canadians but for the total global commons. It is for the benefit of the entire world.
The good news is that I am happy to report that Canada’s forests are well managed. We have some of the strictest and most stringent policies when it comes to sustainable forest management. Canada is the global leader when it comes to forest certification. That means you, as a consumer, can feel confident that products coming from Canada are sourced from sustainable sources.
The other thing to note is that within Canada, the rate of deforestation is one of the lowest in the entire world. Very little of that would come from the forest sector. The rate is 0.02 per cent across the Canadian landscape, one of the lowest in the entire world.
How are forests affected by carbon and climate change? It is undeniable that we are living in a changing climate. Forests are affected by that, and they are expected to continue to be affected by it. Some of these examples are well known, and you can probably see them in the news these days. One perfect example is that dryer and milder climates can exacerbate or elongate the fire season. It is suspected that fires will be larger, more intense and more frequent. In 2014 alone, approximately 4 million hectares of forests were burned through forest fires. Obviously, that is the 2014 statistic. We have seen fires burning across British Columbia this past year, so that number is expected to have increased for this year.
Pests and diseases are being affected by carbon and climate change. The mountain pine beetle in British Columbia is a perfect example of that. In 2013, approximately 20 million hectares of forests were affected by pests and diseases.
The other thing to note is that these factors don’t exist within silos; they are interacting with each other. To go back to that issue of the mountain pine beetle, it means you have these dead forests that act as perfect fuel for forest fires.
The other thing to note within this context is that we have a number of communities that are dependent upon forests and forest management, and folks living within forested areas. It is not just the forests that are affected, but there is the challenge of human health and safety when some of these factors come into play.
The good-news story is that the forest sector is part of the solution here. Properly managed forests can contribute to climate change mitigation. Having healthy, productive, working forests means that our trees can continue to store and sequester carbon.
The other good-news story is that through innovative wood products, we can also sequester additional carbon as well. If we start replacing fossil-fuel-intensive products, such as concrete and steel, for example, with wood products, we have the potential to store more carbon within these long-lived wood products. Some examples might be policy changes within high-rise construction to utilize more wood versus concrete or steel.
The green or bioenergy economy is another. That’s utilizing alternative forms of energy, particularly wood energy and energy found in our own backyard.
The other important item to note here is that registered professional foresters are entrusted to manage our forests in a sustainable way. Few people are aware that these are licensed professionals and one of the few professionals we entrust to manage our natural resources.
There is a good-news story to come out of this. The one take-home I hope we can all leave here with is that the forest sector and those working within it — not just the forest industry but government, NGOs, the Wood Products Association — all have a role to play in mitigating and adapting to climate change.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you very much. If we limit ourselves to one question each, we may have time for a second round. Senator Mercer has the floor.
[English]
Senator Mercer: Thank you for your presentations. You mentioned a couple of things; for example, the mountain pine beetle. I have been on this committee a long time. I’ve visited northern British Columbia and saw the dramatic effects of the mountain pine beetle and the difficulty that British Columbians had in managing it. What do you do with all this dead wood? They tried to be inventive, including making furniture out of it and doing every other thing.
With the forest fire season that we have just gone through, there is a theory that forest fires are a natural occurrence. Should we be concerned that the natural occurrences now have become much bigger situations than natural occurrences would have had if we had allowed nature to take its course? Then we interfere with it by then trying to stop the fires.
We are trying to talk today about the effects of climate change in the agriculture sector and the forestry sector, but we also want to talk about the imposition of a carbon tax and its effect on this sector as well.
Ms. Collins: I will speak briefly to your first point. I may defer that to John as our Western Canada representative.
With regard to your first point about the mountain pine beetle, forest fires and what-have-you, yes, most of Canada’s forests are ecologically adapted to large-scale disasters such as pests, disease and forest fires. The challenge now is that they will become more frequent, larger and more intense than what would naturally occur across the landscape. It is expected that in some of these areas, the fires might be 10 to100 times greater than they would have been naturally.
The other thing within this greater climate change discussion is that when forests burn, it emits an incredible amount of carbon back into the atmosphere. If there is a way that we can manage those forests, especially forests that are right now susceptible to forest fire — maybe ones that have been affected or are expected to be affected by mountain pine beetle — and if we can develop those wood products into innovative products that are storing that carbon within the wood, and legally we have to replant across the landscape, there is a potential for not only carbon storage within the wood products but future sequestration through new planting. John, do you want to add to that?
Jonathan Lok, Past President, Canadian Institute of Forestry: That is a great question. I am a resident of British Columbia and had first-hand experience with the fires this summer; over 1 million hectares were affected. You are absolutely correct that fire is a naturally occurring disturbance pattern that we experience out west. In fact, many of the forests are evolved to be replaced by these same fires. About 60 or 75 years ago, we chose to prevent fires from happening on the land base by intervening and putting them out. The intention was to save those to provide wood products through manufacturing. We were unable to harvest fast enough or regularly enough, and during that time, much of the undergrowth came up and created a more intensive fuel hazard. When you couple that with the mountain beetle, which you have experienced first-hand, over the last 20 years, all of these cumulative impacts have created the fire bomb that went off this year.
We can choose to let natural processes try to replace the stands, get back to how it was and the accompanying carbon release that is uncontrolled and goes along with that, or we can choose to create a more comprehensive and intensive intervention, which would involve manipulating that stand. Part of that is recovering through harvesting; some of it is through strategic land design and creating fire breaks; some of it is fuel removal where we could increase utilization to encourage things like biomass and various energy sources that Ms. Koven was referring to.
The option to carry on with the status quo is it not necessarily the appropriate option, nor is it to let nature run its course. But I think it is more of an intensive management regime that is applied strategically across the land base to reduce public risk, to ensure viable industries and rural economic development, and to promote alternative uses in carbon sequestration.
Senator Mercer: I have also visited the Irving operation in northern New Brunswick where they are very much involved in forestry management. The thinning of the undergrowth is a process that they use. It is remarkable how they do it but the results are also remarkable, as is the quality of the product that they are now starting to harvest. They have been at this for 50 years and are starting to harvest some of the trees.Is this a process that can be applied universally across the country? I know that Irving is a big company that has access to a lot of land, but is this a process that can be exported to British Columbia and northern Alberta, et cetera?
Mr. Lok: The practice is used widely. It is very cost-intensive. That is typically what prohibits the application of it. Used strategically, and in certain amounts, I think it can enhance the resiliency of the forests. Another approach would be the reincorporation of the use of prescribed burning, reintroducing fire as a tool naturally into the ecosystems. There is an array of tactics that can be used. The one you mentioned is a primary and important one that needs to be more broadly applied and invested in, but I believe there are other strategies that would make sense across the landscape as well.
Senator Woo: I think I heard Senator Mercer ask for your opinion on a carbon tax in the industry. I will preface the question by saying that while the Institute of Forestry is not the forestry industry per se, I would like a view from the institute, on the one hand, and your perception of the views of the industry on the other.
Also, as part of the same question, give us a sense of the contribution of the forestry sector to carbon emissions from Canada and how you come to that number, because it is a complex calculation of both the existing stand of forests and the wood products that are harvested; obviously the fuel and energy burned in harvesting; transportation to the coast. What is added and what is not added?
Ms. Collins: Do either of you want to take on the carbon tax question?
Anne Koven, Adjunct Professor, University of Toronto, as an individual: I couldn’t possibly speak on behalf of the forest industry. I have no idea what their positions would be and whether it would be a united position or whether they would have very different views. The forest industry across Canada is very diversified. You are talking about very small saw millers in Ontario and Quebec who have suffered greatly through softwood lumber and market problems in the last 10 years. You are talking about the pulp and paper industry in Eastern Canada, which has a completely different set of problems and has been in transition. So I couldn’t possibly answer that. British Columbia has something very different.
I am not an expert in carbon tax. My first interaction with the idea of a carbon tax or the whole idea of climate change was about 15 years ago. At that point, the Canadian Forest Service was very early in this field. They came out to Ontario and said, “We want to do something about afforestation of private lands.” That was called the Forest 20/20 project. At that point, the federal government, through the Canadian Forest Service, invested not a lot of money but some money. It was as a result of that that in Ontario we today have an organization called Forests Ontario. We have afforested thousands of acres of private land, often helped through something called the Managed Forest Tax Incentive Program. There has been movement over the years to approach private landowners to combine their forest land in the event of a cap and trade system or a carbon tax system and to be able to sell those emissions.
Again, I am not an expert in whether cap and trade or a carbon tax is a better approach. I think it is a very political decision. You could have discussions all day about the economics but at the end of the day, it is a very political decision. I also think there is no doubt that we have to do something on both hands. One is to reduce the amount of emissions, as we are obliged to do by international agreements and otherwise, and we also have to be able to help industries and individuals who will suffer as a result of that.
Again, when I look at the forest industry, it’s a very diversified industry and cannot be treated as one entity.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Thank you to our guests. My question is for Ms. Collins.
We have a next-door neighbor called the United States. There are surely similarities between the forests of Oregon and those of British Columbia. Could you tell us about the differences in the way our neighbors manage their forests? Could you also compare the results obtained in terms of the management methods used in the two countries?
[English]
Ms. Collins: I will say a few things to start. A major one would be that within Canada, 94 per cent of our forests are Crown forests. The public can have a role in providing input on how it’s managed. Management plans have to go out for public consultation. Six per cent of our forests are privately owned. That is almost the opposite in the United States. Most of their forests are privately managed. Few are publicly owned and managed. Generally speaking, there are smaller management units relative to Canada. Here we have much larger units, millions of hectares in some cases, which are managed at any given time.
The other major thing to note is that because we have much larger management units that are being managed, we have greater opportunity to seek out certification. Relative to the United States, we have a much higher degree of forest certification. As mentioned earlier, that guarantees the consumer that wood harvested from Canadian forest is coming from a sustainably managed source.
As you move from a northern latitude to a southern one, the composition of the forest will be different. I think most folks have been made aware of some of the softwood lumber disputes and negotiations that are ongoing. The difference is also in the composition of species. So there is an opportunity for Canada, for example, to continue to provide softwood to the United States. I don’t believe they have the domestic resources to supply all the softwood they need to support their housing market. Those opportunities still continue to lie within Canada.
Mr. Lok: I was going to mention that certainly in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S., being from British Columbia and recognizing what’s happening in Washington and Oregon, there’s less of an active management paradigm with respect to harvesting in the nationally owned forests, and that is a concern to some of the Americans that I speak with. They see active management across the landscape in British Columbia and feel that there is more active involvement in a cohesive way. Whereas, as Dana refers to, there tends to be a bit more of a patchwork approach and it is perhaps hard to gain monumental environmental impact, I guess, if you’re working in a patchwork type of process.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: In forest management, would you say that the private method produces better results?
[English]
Mr. Lok: It would depend on what metrics you are using to describe as better.
Ms. Koven: May I add something to the response? I don’t know much about the management regimes in Oregon, but, from my point of view, with climate change, I’m very forward-looking and I want to look at solutions. One thing that I know Oregon is doing that is very interesting is that at the University of Oregon they have put together in the last five years a very successful collaboration among — they call it the Tallwood Design Institute. It’s a collaboration among two universities and a college, a faculty of forestry and two colleges, also with their architecture school.They are very positively looking at ways of capturing CO2 in wood products and bringing home the message to people that building with wood is a very good idea.
Certainly in Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec, we’re looking at tall wood building construction. I think that offers a fantastic opportunity to deal with climate change that at the same time promotes sustainable and resilient wood products, addresses climate change and also really showcases that kind of technology and wood construction projects. I know in Toronto the building trades are very excited about this potential. I think it’s something Canada has to offer. Certainly the collaboration that’s going on at the University of Oregon is very interesting.
Senator Tardif: Thank you for being here today. You made mention in your presentation of the natural catastrophes that have affected the forestry industry. I spent some time in British Columbia this summer and saw first-hand the damage and devastation created by forest fires. Also pine beetles.
You may also have answered this question, but with all of these natural catastrophes, what effect is this having in the short and long term on your sector? The cost must obviously be enormous. How do you move forward and how are you coping with those circumstances?
Ms. Collins: I’ll first start off by saying yes, there are going to be short-term as well as mid-term challenges, particularly with timber supply, not just because some of these forests are greatly affected and sort of wiped out — some of them are dead from these forest fires — but we start to change the species composition and distribution and the age class as well. In an area that’s been affected by a forest fire, it means that now we only have younger stands that are coming up. It’s predicted there might be younger stands or forest experience across the landscape.
John can speak to it quite a bit in that their chief forester just wrote the annual allowable cut for British Columbia, and a lot of that will have to be rearranged and redone to account for the fires and mountain pine beetle challenges that are happening out West.
Mr. Lok: Certainly the human impact is yet to be calculated, to be honest. Obviously the mountain pine beetle is a naturally occurring phenomenon that was exacerbated by the history of fire suppression that I alluded to earlier. It’s been about 20 years since we’ve been dealing with the pine beetle. It has crested, and the chief forester had finally made the determinations, and then all of a sudden this fire ripped through. Honestly, I would say it probably wasn’t not expected. We knew fires would occur, perhaps not this quick and perhaps not this widespread impact of over a million hectares.
But if the initial math is saying that there may have been 60 million cubic metres of cut that was available to the midterm timber supply, we’re counting on communities like Williams Lake and Quesnel to help them ride out for the next several years. These are thousands of jobs and manufacturing facilities that are potentially going to be impacted. At Williams Lake, a good friend of mine is a chief forester in that community, and he said currently there are three sawmills and one plywood mill. In five years, he would expect there will be one working sawmill and one plywood mill in that community, for example. So the loss of hundreds of jobs in a community of 15,000 is significant.
The forest will recover. Restoration efforts are already being discussed. Rehabilitation is beginning. Nature will do its thing, but the human toll, the human impact and how that more broadly impacts the social fabric and all Canadians is a question. The indigenous population and the First Nations around that area will certainly be trying to figure out how they are economically impacted on their own lands.
Senator Gagné: Climate change has an effect on forest growth rates and even the distribution of species.I was wondering if you feel that Canada is well equipped to track, monitor and measure all the ongoing changes in the forest stock. Are we able to project the impact of climate change in our forests in the future?
Fred Pinto, Past President, Canadian Institute of Forestry: I can start with that one. Are we well positioned? Yes, we do have really well-trained people in Canada. We have good infrastructure and good inventories. We have some of the leading knowledge on the subject in Canada, so we can play a role. What we need to do is ensure that we continue to have well-trained people who are able to provide these services.
One of the things we need to put in place is information to young people about where the jobs are and what type of jobs are available. Right now, a person graduating from an accredited program in forestry gets a job within six months. It’s the highest rate of uptake of any professional group in Canada. Young people have to know that.
The other thing is, we’re kind of tentative to answer some of the questions because as some of you have already identified, it’s complicated. We have a saying in forestry that forestry is not rocket science; it’s more complicated. It’s not just on climate change but you also have to deal with biodiversity and people’s livelihoods and safety. The solutions to those have to come from the local context.
One solution that Canada has, eight provinces have regulatory forest professionals, of which four provinces have a right to practise regulation — British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec — and we can use these people because they are now responsible for protecting the public interest. We can use them to develop the local carbon management plan, biodiversity plan and forest sustainability plan and make this information available to the public so they can ultimately make the decision as to what is the appropriate choice they want to use for their community.
It’s not a simple answer for each area; it has to be locally derived because of the local infrastructure that’s in place and the technologies available. We have to integrate technological principles with technology.
For example, the ice storm we had about four Christmases ago in southern Ontario resulted in different communities losing electricity for quite a while. Those communities that had professional foresters working for them had less of an impact and recovered faster. So we have solutions here in Canada; let’s use them.
The second thing is we are developing forest carbon plans, et cetera. Again, use those regulatory professionals, just as we use engineers, for example. It’s not going to be just a direct government solution; it has to come from integrating and using the knowledge level from all of our various people and making sure young people realize these opportunities are available. We can do that here and then we can export the solutions around the world.
Mr. Lok: I have one small addition. The only place I would differ with Fred is that I hear a global lament that the status of inventories is not where it should be, given the increasing importance of forestry.We do have great people to do inventories and we have a reasonable inventory, but in terms of more sustained momentum on the inventory file, I think every province and probably every jurisdiction around the world would look for that. That is an area where improvement could be led from the national government.
[Translation]
The Chair: Mr. Pinto, you talked about a forestry regime. In another life, in Quebec, I was a member of another parliament. In 1986, we developed a new forestry regime. We nationalized the forests, which had belonged to big companies, in what we called forestry concessions. Together with the companies, we established supply contracts for their industry, contracts in which they paid five times what they were spending before. The government was building roads, and they were not designed to last for one year, but rather for 10 years, because the government was choosing the logging areas.
There was also a policy, which you do not seem to be familiar with, because I do not think you did a lot of work with the Government of Quebec in this respect. The policy was that for every tree cut a tree would be planted. Quebec did not invent that policy; it started with Irving in New Brunswick. The model Quebec used to develop its new forestry regime was Irving’s. Bureaucrats wanted to send us to Sweden, Norway and Denmark, but the best solution for our forests in Quebec was the Irving model, and we applied it.
What I would like to know is whether you who work with the forestry industry are aware of the plan that forestry companies as a whole will put in place in order to reduce carbon emissions in the future.
[English]
Mr. Pinto: I’m not sure what the forest industry is going to put forward in the future, but I think a number of things need to be put in place before that answer can be provided.There has to be an analysis done at the provincial level to determine what the right strategies will be, and also at the regional level, and then what role does the industry play at the local level.
The solutions will come from different areas. One of the benefits we’ve had, if you look at the past, is that Canada has played a major role in terms of some of the major environmental issues we’ve had. When we were involved in those issues, it was complicated and messy. We are looking at acid precipitation, for example, and Canada played a major role in that. If you’re looking at the ozone depletion, again Canada played a major role. These are things that have actually worked.
Similarly here, with this carbon, or greenhouse gases, it’s complicated and it’s even kind of a more inclusive thing. It’s everything we do. All ecosystems are based on energy. All human civilizations are based on energy. It’s a complicated thing to deal with.
What solutions will ultimately take place? At the current time, I personally don’t have the information as to what may be used, but there are things already in play.
For example, if you look at the acid rain conversation, United States is a federated country and Canada is a federated country. There were different solutions in different states and provinces. That, as you mentioned, resulted in a solution.
[Translation]
The Chair: Let me stop you, because that is not what I want to know. I want to know if you are aware of the plan that the Canadian forestry industry as a whole wants to implement for carbon. Are you aware of it? Does the forestry industry have a plan? When will it be put in place? How will the plan work? You are the Canadian Institute of Forestry, after all. There must be someone who consults you from time to time. Do forestry companies consult you about carbon emissions? Explain that to us; it is important.
[English]
Ms. Collins: I’ll start off here. One thing to make note of is that, yes, we’re working with industry in some ways, but we’re working with this interdisciplinary aspect of the forest sector. It includes the biologists, ecologists, engineers, forest practitioners, technologists and policymakers. There’s a whole slew of folks who are interacting to address this challenge of carbon and climate change.I would mostly like to note that industry is one part of the solution, but for the folks we’re working with, it’s far more interdisciplinary than that.
One area that industry is focusing on is the development of innovative wood products. Right now, when it comes to policy that’s being implemented on the ground with regard to our natural resources, I mentioned in my opening speech that it tends to be very strict policies. When trees are taken out, legally they must be replanted to ensure that the forest industry is not contributing to deforestation.
On the other hand, there is a real push towards innovative wood products that have the ability to mitigate the effects of climate change by substituting fossil fuel-intensive products with more green products.
[Translation]
The Chair: I understand that you are not in contact with the forestry industry about that. Who should we speak to, as the Agriculture and Forestry Committee, to find out about the Canadian forestry industry’s plan for reducing carbon emissions? Who should we talk to? I thought the Canadian Institute of Forestry was the right group, but you are telling me that you are not. So who should we speak to?
This is very important. We are talking about 346 million acres in Canada, which is a significant part of the country. Somewhere here below, there surely has to be someone close to the Canadian forestry industry who is responsible. I am not saying this to criticize you; it is just that we want to know what the industry intends to do in the future, and we are not getting an answer. We need an answer for our report. If you could put us in touch with the decision-makers in the Canadian forestry industry, we would be most grateful.
[English]
Senator Petitclerc: This is more of a precision than a question, but it keeps popping into my head. Many times in your comments you mentioned using wooden construction or products in order to absorb and store CO2. This is one of the solutions for climate. I want to have an idea of how big, on the scale of things, that solution is. I do understand that every little part adds up and helps, but I have no idea. If everybody starts to build houses out of wood, are we going to save the planet, or is it minimal but still important? I want to have a range of how effective that solution is.
Ms. Collins: It is a hard concept to wrap your head around: How much carbon can we save? One of the examples that has been cited in some of the research going into this is that if you look at a four-storey building that’s built out of concrete and steel versus one that’s built out of wood, the carbon savings in the one built out of wood would be the equivalent of taking about 100 cars off the road for an entire year. That’s a little easier to wrap your head around. It is a fairly significant amount, and again it’s because that carbon is stored in the wood over the long term.
Senator Petitclerc: That really helps. It’s more significant than I thought.
Senator Woo: How high can we go now with wood buildings?
Ms. Collins: It changes from province to province. Each province has jurisdiction over setting the policy for that. I think B.C. right now has the highest, at 14.
Mr. Lok: British Columbia just opened one at 14 storeys.
Senator Woo: From an engineering perspective, can we go higher?
Ms. Collins: Yes.
Mr. Lok: Europe has recently done 18, I believe.
Senator Mercer: I should point out that the committee, in the past, did a study on the use of wood. We visited the wonderful Olympic stadium in Richmond, British Columbia, and we’ve seen some other places. We are not using wood in as creative a way as we can. And you can go high; six storeys is a good benchmark.
[Translation]
The Chair: As for the provinces, let us take Quebec, for example, where there is legislation for the construction sector mandating the use of wood for a certain percentage of the work, particularly when building gymnasiums and indoor soccer arenas. Despite the temperature in Quebec in February, soccer remains popular, but it is played indoors. There are provinces that have legislation on building standards that require a certain percentage of the building materials to be wood.
Thank you for your testimony today. As you can see, the committee is always happy to hear various opinions, because we must produce a report and we need people like you. If, however, you have anything else to add, please do not hesitate to send us your comments to our clerk. We will be happy to look at them closely in order to improve our report for the benefit of Canadians.
Thank you, and good evening.
(The committee adjourned.)