THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE AND FORESTRY
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Tuesday, November 25, 2025
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met with videoconference this day at 6:31 p.m. [ET], to examine and report on the role of the agriculture and agri-food sector with regard to food security in Canada; and, in camera, to consider a draft agenda (future business).
Senator John M. McNair (Deputy Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Deputy Chair: Honourable senators, I call to order this meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry.
My name is John McNair, and I am the deputy chair of this committee. Welcome to the members of the committee, our witnesses, as well as those watching this meeting on the web.
I would like to start by acknowledging that the land on which we gather is the unceded, traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe Nation.
Before we hear from our witnesses, I would like to start by asking the senators around the table to introduce themselves.
Senator Burey: Sharon Burey, Ontario.
Senator Varone: Toni Varone, Ontario.
Senator Robinson: Mary Robinson, Prince Edward Island.
Senator McBean: Marnie McBean, Ontario.
Senator Muggli: Tracy Muggli, Treaty 6 territory, Saskatchewan.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you, all, and perfect timing, Senator Robinson. It was very well done.
I would like to ask all senators to consult the cards on the table for guidelines to prevent audio feedback incidents. I would also like to remind all those participating to refrain from switching languages mid-sentence and to not speak too quickly. Clear audio supports accurate interpretation, transcription and captioning.
Today, the committee is continuing its study on the role of the agriculture and agri-food sector with regard to food security in Canada.
For our first panel, we will have 45 minutes. We are welcoming tonight, from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, or AAFC, Liz Foster, Assistant Deputy Minister, Programs Branch; Sophie Beecher, Director General, Sustainable Development Policy Directorate, Strategic Policy Branch; and Jason Baillargeon, Director, Food Policy Division, Strategic Policy Branch. Joining us by video conference is Felicitas Katepa-Mupondwa, Director General, Prairie Region, Science and Technology Branch.
Thank you to all of you for accepting to appear before our committee. You will have five minutes for your opening remarks. They will be followed by questions from the senators. I will signal that your time is running out by raising one hand when you have one minute left, and I will raise both hands when your time is up. It is a hard stop at that point.
Ms. Beecher, the floor is yours. Welcome.
[Translation]
Sophie Beecher, Director General, Sustainable Development Policy Directorate, Strategic Policy Branch, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada: Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the opportunity to appear before the committee to discuss the role of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and the sector as a whole in supporting food security across Canada.
I would like to begin by acknowledging that I am speaking to you today from the traditional and unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe people.
Food security is of critical importance for the department’s work in supporting those who feed our country. In that respect, the department is focused on improving the competitiveness and sustainability of the agriculture and agri-food sector. This includes advancing scientific innovations and solutions, such as plant genetic resources to improve yields and adapt to climate change; diversifying and expanding markets; supporting a range of production methods and farm types; and building supply chain resilience.
I will now talk about the Food Policy for Canada. The first-ever Food Policy for Canada was launched by the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food in 2019. This fulfilled a 2015 mandate letter commitment to develop a food policy that promotes healthy living and safe food, by putting more healthy, high-quality food, produced by Canadian ranchers and farmers, on the tables of families across the country.
The policy was shaped through extensive engagement, including consumers, producers, processors, health practitioners, retailers, Indigenous communities and civil society groups, focused on food security, health and the environment.
These consultations underscored the central role that food plays in the lives of Canadians. The importance of a more coordinated approach to dealing with food issues in Canada was emphasized. Food security emerged as a clear priority, with particular attention to the high rates of food insecurity in racialized, Indigenous and northern communities.
With this priority in mind, the Food Policy for Canada sets a vision where all people are able to access a sufficient amount of safe, nutritious and culturally diverse food. It also aims to ensure that Canada’s food systems are resilient and innovative, while sustaining our environment and supporting our economy.
[English]
As federal lead on the Food Policy for Canada, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada has led initiatives beyond its core mandate to advance this vision by working with a wide range of stakeholders and partners across Canada’s food systems; advancing investments that improve social, health, environmental and economic outcomes; and taking a more whole-of-government approach to strengthen food security. Over time, the Food Policy has adapted to address emerging food security challenges and priorities. It supported community food security through several iterations of the Local Food Infrastructure Fund and coordinated emergency food support for Canadians during the COVID-19 pandemic.
More recently, it has pivoted to advancing longer-term solutions to build stronger local food systems. This was reflected in Budget 2024 with investments in the National School Food Program, the renewal and expansion of the Local Food Infrastructure Fund and new initiatives supporting Inuit food systems and Indigenous food sovereignty, in alignment with the Inuit Nunangat Policy and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Budget 2025 also announced $216.6 million per year, starting in 2029-30, for Employment and Social Development Canada, Indigenous Services Canada and Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada to make the National School Food Program permanent.
Each of these initiatives to improve food security is multi-faceted, involves diverse stakeholders and partners and involves the mandates of several departments and agencies. While Food Policy has helped break down silos between federal departments, food systems are a shared responsibility across jurisdictions. We recognize the need to continue strengthening partnerships with provinces, territories and local governments.
To support improved coordination and measurement of actions, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada is developing a Canadian food security indicator framework. The framework will provide a more comprehensive and integrated understanding of food security to ground policy actions in evidence. Input is being gathered from federal departments, academics, experts and Indigenous partners to shape its development.
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada recognizes that there is more work to be done to strengthen food security for Canadians. We are actively taking stock of the changing context and the evolving challenges we face as a society, and we are reflecting on new directions our department may need to take to strengthen food security and resilience for the future.
Thank you.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you. Senators, we will now proceed to questions. As you know, you have five minutes for your question or questions, and that includes the answers.
Senator McBean: I enjoyed it when you said that there is a “vision” for all people to have access to nutritious food. I’m wondering how you see the reality of that going and how the AAFC is working with provinces, territories and Indigenous governments to create a coordinated national approach to food security rather than just relying on the patchwork of regional responses.
Ms. Beecher: I can start with the second part of the question and let my colleague weigh in on the first part.
The coordinated approach we saw as a unique role for Agriculture Canada. As you all know, food security is not necessarily squarely in the federal mandate. Large parts of it are under provincial and territorial jurisdiction, possibly municipal as well, but there is a recognition, of course, that the federal government has a part to play and can play a unique role.
I know that you have had guests from other departments here before on this topic. Our mandates are in law and are very specific at times. The Department of Agriculture and Agri-Food has a very precise mandate of dealing with agriculture, and that’s all the law says, actually.
We had to be very creative when our minister received the instruction in her mandate letter to try to fit some of our actions within the mandate of Agriculture, and if it didn’t fit squarely, to at least to have a link to primary production of food or the agri-food sector.
Nevertheless, we tried to play the role of coordinator. It started in the consultations and the elaboration of the policy, the ongoing contacts that we have with a very broad number of stakeholders. We had a council made up of key stakeholders who came to the table on a regular basis to offer their expertise on specific questions and offer advice directly to the minister. This included representatives from across Canada from all sorts of sectors: from the food production side of things, from social programming and Indigenous Peoples.
Agriculture tried to coordinate as best it could, and we were successful in many respects, bringing together collections of initiatives under a variety of budget exercises that brought initiatives under the umbrella of the Food Policy, all working toward those objectives and in that vision. But it remains a challenge, of course, because we are leading from the side in that respect and getting people around the table and working together.
Jason, maybe you could take the first part of the question.
Jason Baillargeon, Director, Food Policy Division, Strategic Policy Branch, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada: Quickly on the second part as well, in the context of working with Indigenous partners, through the Food Policy, we did work to advance consultations led by Indigenous partners themselves to engage within communities, and work has been going ever since. For example, we work with Inuit partners through the Inuit-Crown Partnership Committee. There’s a Food Security Working Group to make progress to advance the Inuit Nunangat Food Security Strategy.
In terms of the question around the bold vision that was set forward and making progress toward it, as Ms. Beecher mentioned, there are a number of challenges associated with tracking that and making progress, one primary one being that we look at food insecurity in Canada primarily through an income-based measure. We’re working toward the Canadian food security indicator framework to have a more comprehensive picture in terms of how food security is measured and tracked across government.
Senator McBean: Could you give examples of areas where you have found good traction using Agriculture to get into areas where you say, “How do we solve this problem and say it’s Agriculture doing more?”
Ms. Beecher: A lot of our programs are splendid examples of that where the outcome of the programs is tangible infrastructure to communities to help them in developing local food systems. Similarly, during the COVID pandemic, we had some programs that helped with distribution of food in communities. Liz Foster is our expert on that.
Liz Foster, Assistant Deputy Minister, Programs Branch, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada: I can give examples of the AAFC’s Local Food Infrastructure Fund support, and it is indicative of how it helps.
One large-scale project we supported is one with the Tsawwassen First Nation. That has allowed them to do myriad things. When it is a larger-scale project, they can look at various infrastructure elements all at the same time. Their project included cold storage, refrigeration, greenhouses, composting equipment and, most importantly, the expansion of their community garden and community kitchen. I visited the Tsawwassen First Nation. The funding and support they have received through this program have been hugely beneficial for the food security of their community.
My colleague also mentioned how programming was supportive during the pandemic. At the very beginning, there was a surplus of food with a need to move it to people who wanted to eat that food. The Emergency Food Security Fund and the Surplus Food Rescue Program came into play in those very specific circumstances, which were not necessarily infrastructure-oriented but were about helping distribution of high-quality food for people in need.
Senator Muggli: Thank you for being with us today. We really appreciate it.
In 2021, you had a Food Security Data and Measurement Dialogue that you convened. It revealed some serious weaknesses in the federal food security data system. I want to read a few of these issues into the record, and, hopefully, you can tell us if there have been solutions brought forward on them.
AAFC heard that the federal role in coordinating and owning food security data is unclear. There is insufficient investment in data collection, particularly the kind needed to capture regional realities across the country. Current sampling methods do not adequately reach vulnerable and marginalized populations. Inconsistent definitions of food security across institutions exist, which undermines comparability and measurement. And, unsurprisingly, given all these issues, Canada lacks timely, frequent and longitudinal food security data.
Could you update the committee on whether there have been concrete steps since 2021 to address these specific data gaps?
Mr. Baillargeon: Thank you very much for the question, senator.
That dialogue was undertaken as part of the United Nations Food Systems Summit. We had seven dialogues that led to a final dialogue to put forward improvements toward more resilient, sustainable and healthier food systems in Canada.
We have made progress on a number of those fronts, but much more work needs to be done, particularly around the context of investments and data that may be lacking. We do see opportunities through developing a food security indicator framework that we can look to leverage and pool resources from across government. In some cases, we have data that gets at part of it but does not give us the full picture. By having a more coordinated whole-of-government-based approach, we will address some of the key gaps and also look toward having measures that speak to the mandates of multiple departments, as opposed to looking at measures or indicators that look at the objectives of a single department.
Senator Muggli: Is the indicator framework part of the approach to try to deal with some of these gaps?
Mr. Baillargeon: Correct. It will provide us with measures and a state of play in terms of where we are at currently. In many cases, we don’t have indicators for some of the key six dimensions of food security.
Senator Muggli: What are the key six dimensions? This isn’t a test.
Mr. Baillargeon: It’s okay. If I get this wrong, my team will be upset with me. Availability, access, utilization, stability, agency and sustainability. Sorry, I spoke very quickly.
Senator Muggli: It is in the record now.
Mr. Baillargeon: We are seeing data gaps or indicators related to agency around cultural dimensions of food systems, as well as access beyond income, especially for Indigenous, northern and remote communities.
Senator Muggli: You were saying you need investments in data that is lacking. What do you need? What does that mean, “investment”?
Mr. Baillargeon: Essentially, putting together surveys or other data collection methods in order to get data to identify those specific dimensions. For example, we have very good data through the Canadian Income Survey, which measures food insecurity. That is people’s economic access to food — whether they have enough money to afford food. But we don’t have indicators on, for example, whether communities are able to access food of cultural importance to them, whether households have appropriate food skills in order to make full use of food — additional measures around food loss and waste reduction.
Senator Muggli: Why don’t we have that?
Mr. Baillargeon: Currently, it’s an area we are exploring as government in terms of future investment.
Senator Muggli: Investment meaning that you need people power? What do you need?
Mr. Baillargeon: Primarily, we need better coordination across government. It is not always a question of additional funding but making best use of the resources we have available.
Senator Muggli: So perhaps that could appear as a recommendation in our report. Does that make sense?
Ms. Beecher: Perhaps.
Senator Burey: Thank you so much for being here. This is exciting for me, and I want to salute the government for making the National School Food Program permanent — I like to hear those words — and for the leadership that your department took on convening the Food Policy. Of course, Canada had been lagging. There is work to be done, but we have started.
I have many questions, but I’m going to bring Ms. Felicitas Katepa-Mupondwa forward. Can you tell me what your job is and what it involves? Then please speak about the science and innovation that you are trying to bring to the Food Policy and the food security file.
Felicitas Katepa-Mupondwa, Director General, Prairie Region, Science and Technology Branch, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada: Absolutely. I am responsible for the Science and Technology Branch centres in the Prairie region, so in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. We have six research centres working in various areas of science from animal science to crop production. My particular interest today relates to the plant genetic resources and the role they play in promoting food security.
So plant gene resources in Canada are held in three gene banks under the Canadian national germplasm system. The gene banks were established specifically to combat genetic erosion and to preserve genetic diversity of field crops and horticultural crops. Genetic diversity is a foundation for food security and agricultural sustainability. I will explain in a minute.
The first gene bank is the Plant Gene Resources of Canada in Saskatoon. Here, we preserve 120,000 accessions or unique samples of field crops and their wild relatives. That includes important crops such as wheat, oat, barley, maize, forages, canola, oilseeds and many other crops.
The second gene bank is the Canadian Clonal Genebank in Harrow. There, we preserve 3,500 accessions of fruit clonal material, including apples, pears, plums and cherries. These are held in orchards. We have grapes in vineyards. We have blueberries, strawberries, raspberries and many other berries, and those accessions are held in greenhouses.
The third gene bank is the Canadian Potato Gene Resources, and that’s in Fredericton. The focus is on potatoes. There, we preserve 223 accessions of Canadian-bred varieties, heritage varieties and wild relatives of potato.
The Canadian national germplasm system plays a critical role in ensuring the security and sustainability of agriculture by protecting and preserving the genetic diversity of over 121,000 accessions of 980 species of crops and their wild relatives. These accessions are thoroughly characterized using descriptive data, and then the data is entered into an international data system called GRIN-Global. So all the materials in the collection are made available for breeding, research and education free of charge under the terms and conditions of the multilateral system. This provision enables scientific characterization. Most of these —
Senator Burey: Okay. Are there any challenges that you face in securing this data bank?
Ms. Katepa-Mupondwa: The main challenges really would be the vast number of genetic resources around the world and making sure we collect representative samples — so just the resources needed; it is a lot of work. It is just the resources required to handle a large number of samples. That would be the main challenge, I would say.
Senator Varone: Thank you. I’m going to pick up on the data gap.
Statistics Canada, when they formulated this report on income survey, denoted that 10 million Canadians, or 25.5% of the population, in 10 provinces experience some form of food insecurity. When I went to try to track the data and drill down further — if Canada has 40 million people and 80% are in urban centres, that means there are 32 million people in urban centres and only 8 million in rural and deep rural communities. I was trying to track the number as to what the cause of the food insecurity really was. Is it unavailability of food? Is it the cost being prohibitively high? We heard during testimony in previous meetings that they have to fly the food into remote communities.
I question StatCan because there is a huge gap in the data. As policy-makers, you want to make on-point policy decisions. Do you have the data you need to present to us so that we can look at the solutions or at least table the solutions we think you need? I’m having real difficulty getting to the source numbers of where that problem lies — whether it is cost, unavailability or remoteness. There are solutions to all of them. Just the mere fact that 32 million people are in urban centres — that speaks to 2 million of the 10 million that StatCan is highlighting. That is not unavailability; it has to be food cost. But where is that data?
Ms. Beecher: Yes, there is a data issue. Also, in part of the answer to your question, we have spoken to a lot of academics and experts in this field, and the evidence seems to point to the main factor in food insecurity being related to household or family income. The problem of food security is so complex because you take yourself out of the realm of food and ag policy at that point, and you are more into social programming and policy.
Of course, food access has a role to play. My colleague Jason Baillargeon mentioned there are a lot of remote regions and communities in Canada that just don’t have access. When they do, the food is prohibitively expensive. Then, of course, there has been inflation, which is a whole other issue around affordability that involves a whole other group of players around the table.
For us at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, the real question is what role the federal Department of Agriculture can play. To be very honest with you, the biggest role we can play is likely on access to food and whether there is food produced at the local level that is healthy and direct to the consumer in some cases — where people have contact with those who produce their food, and that offers them alternative avenues of the source of their food in the case of a crisis or shock to society.
On the question of the data, Jason, do you have anything else to add?
Senator Varone: Let me reframe one last part of that: Are you in collaboration with Statistics Canada in terms of when they go out in the field to ask the questions? Do they know the kinds of questions you need answers for?
Mr. Baillargeon: We are, and the stat that you referred to again is from the Canadian Income Survey, which has 17 questions that are all about a household’s ability to afford food. In order to address that stat, as my colleague indicated, it is largely through income-based interventions, with some exceptions, depending on physical access to food being an issue in some communities. But largely, in Canada, it is a question of income.
That said, that is why we are looking at creating a broader Canadian food security indicator framework that speaks to some of the indicators that my colleague had mentioned as well. We are not just looking at income.
Yes, we’ve been working with StatCan and other departments and agencies on that very enterprise.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you. I apologize for being late. I am Karen Sorensen, senator for Alberta, Treaty 7 territory.
Senator McBean took my questions that I had as soon as I sat down, but I have new ones. I will combine these two questions for whoever is most appropriate to answer: What do you think is the weakest single point of failure in Canada’s food system? And then, on a more positive note, what is the most promising innovation that could increase agricultural resilience in the next 10 years?
Ms. Beecher: Those are huge questions.
Senator Sorensen: Just jump outside your box there.
Ms. Beecher: I would not say that there is a single biggest point of failure.
Senator Sorensen: What are the greatest concerns? Maybe that would make it less dramatic.
Ms. Beecher: Right. It is fair to say that Canada is extremely fortunate in the sense that we produce a lot of food. The quantity of food in Canada is not an issue.
Senator Sorensen: Yes.
Ms. Beecher: Where there are issues is with fairness of access and distribution. Are we able to process our own food in Canada, or does it have to leave our country and come back in to be consumed? There are some notable cases of that.
Senator Sorensen: Yes.
Ms. Beecher: Yet we have a very strong food manufacturing and food processing sector. I think the stat is 80% of what they produce lands on Canadian tables.
Mr. Baillargeon: Correct. Yes, the food processing sector accounts for between 70% to 80% of food consumed in Canada.
Senator Sorensen: That’s a success.
Mr. Baillargeon: It is the vast majority.
Ms. Beecher: Yes, so I think the biggest challenge that we have is sometimes with food-system thinking. We demonstrate it sometimes at the federal level where Transport Canada takes care of transport; Health Canada takes care of nutrition and Canada’s food guide. Agriculture takes care of primary food production, and we do not necessarily inject a food-systems way of thinking in how we do policy. We are trying. We are really trying, through coordination and educating ourselves and working with international organizations on this kind of concept.
There is a lot that we could do with lenses. When we design policy at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, it is not a bad thing to ask ourselves what the impact is of what we are designing on the health of Canadians or access to food or pricing. Of course, we are an economic department. We are mainly concerned about maintaining the competitiveness of our ag sector. That is our number one priority. Of course, we want them to have long-term viability because that is fundamentally what will secure our food security, in any case.
However, there are things that we could do. We have a huge pulse sector. Why aren’t Canadians eating more pulses? That is a legitimate question.
Those are questions that we ask ourselves on a daily basis.
Senator Sorensen: It’s good, and my previous note said that inexperience with strong intentions and a true whole-of-government approach is not always prioritized in practice.
Ms. Beecher: Yes.
Senator Sorensen: If I could quickly add, I get intrigued when I visit universities, particularly the researchers. Do you have specific work that you do and fund in partnership with universities and colleges? Clearly, it is endless.
Ms. Beecher: Yes. My science colleague would probably be best placed because they work very closely with universities on all sorts of science projects.
We do not necessarily fund them. They are funded out of the agencies under the umbrella of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, or ISED, but we work jointly with universities on some of those projects.
I do not know if Felicitas Katepa-Mupondwa wants to take part of this question.
Ms. Katepa-Mupondwa: Absolutely. You are correct; some of our collaborations with universities are with them getting funding from ISED, and we collaborate with them.
We have a lot of collaborations through our Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, or S-CAP, the agricultural policy framework programming clusters and agri-science projects. Most of those are in collaboration with universities. Yes, we work with them all the time.
Senator Sorensen: And across the country, I assume?
Ms. Katepa-Mupondwa: Across the country, yes, absolutely.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you.
Senator Robinson: Nice to see you all again.
You mentioned the National School Food Program in the budget implementation act, or BIA. In the bill, we know that the minister has not been designated yet. We expect that will happen, probably, by an order-in-council. I am thinking that there could be multiple ministers responsible for this. I would like to know if you think the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food has a role to play in it, or maybe even, perhaps, if AAFC has a role to play in the oversight of it. Do you think that would be AAFC alone or AAFC in tandem with other ministries?
Mr. Baillargeon: To take a step back in terms of the development of the policy and program itself, the Government of Canada’s intent to move forward with a National School Food Policy was first announced as part of our Food Policy way back in Budget 2019. Since that time, we have been working with colleagues in Employment and Social Development Canada, or ESDC, Health Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada and a number of others to make progress towards it. The policy was informed by multiple perspectives and is very much looking to take a systems-based approach.
Moving forward, regardless of the minister lead, we will continue to work in close collaboration with other departments and agencies to ensure that the objectives of the Food Policy are reflected.
Ms. Beecher: We work regularly with ESDC to ensure there is a link with agriculture, and we see it in the policy where there is a principle of locally sourced food.
That sort of criteria are applied by the provinces themselves, but we do regularly discuss this particular principle with ESDC.
Senator Robinson: The Senate will study the BIA. I look at this, and maybe it is an exceptional opportunity for agriculture, and we could be that critical voice and partner on food security in the country. I wonder if you would agree that it might be nice for the Agriculture and Forestry Committee to study that.
Ms. Beecher: We leave the business of the Agriculture and Forestry Committee to the Agriculture and Forestry Committee.
Senator Robinson: Chicken.
Thank you.
The Deputy Chair: Colleagues, we will go to Senator Muggli next, and then I will let a number of senators put questions on the record.
Actually, Senator Muggli, you should probably put it on the record, as we have run out of time.
Senator Muggli: I’m wondering what your operating definition of “food security” is if you have one. If you don’t have an operating definition of “food security,” what would you recommend? You have time to think about that and put it into writing. If you do have a definition, is it nationally, provincially and municipally adopted? We are going to need to have a fundamental basis for the definition of “food security.”
I will throw in the other question: You talked about investments in yield enhancement. Is that about national food security, or is that about supporting producers to increase yields so we can enhance international trade?
Ms. Beecher: Are we answering all the questions now?
The Deputy Chair: No, we are not answering. We have run out of time. If you could put the answers in writing.
Ms. Beecher: We have a lot to say on both topics.
Senator Muggli: Excellent. I look forward to it.
Senator Burey: I have two quick questions. First of all, farm-to-table incentives that provide locally grown food and accessibility — could you comment on that, especially in mandating or giving preference to local food acquisition?
The next question is this: Regarding food security and protecting agricultural lands, is there any collaboration between ministries, for example, between Build Canada Homes and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada in terms of land use?
Senator McBean: Senator Sorensen and I heard earlier today from a group, and one of the things they mentioned were the different regulations with things like, for example, plastics and recycling from province to province. What specific investments or regulatory changes would be most effective to support Canadian farmers in scaling up sustainable production while keeping food affordable for Canadian households?
Senator Varone: Senator McBean, Senator Black and I visited a greenhouse last week. Some of the questions that were answered were, “Where did the seeds come from?” and “Where did the equipment come from?” Given it was a sizable operation, none of the seeds came from Canada. None of the equipment came from Canada. It all came from the Benelux countries. My question is this: When we talk about R&D, and you mentioned that in your opening remarks, where is the R&D money going? Are we trying to be self-sufficient in Canada, or do we need to continually rely on partners around the world?
Senator Robinson: We’re studying food security in Canada. We have heard, in particular, from our horticulture farmers, from vegetable growers in Canada how exposed they are in regard to labour. I wonder if you could put a lens on how vital the Temporary Foreign Worker Program and the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program, or SAWP, in particular, are to food security within Canada.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you. I wish to thank the witnesses for their participation today. Your testimony and insights are very much appreciated. You can see that the committee could continue asking you questions. We would appreciate receiving written responses to those questions put on the record.
For our second panel tonight, we welcome Dennis Laycraft, Executive Vice President of the Canadian Cattle Association; and Ron Lemaire, President of the Canadian Produce Marketing Association. And joining us by video conference from Food and Beverage Canada are Kristina Farrell, Chief Executive Officer, and Jean-Emmanuel Poitras, Director of Policy and Regulatory Affairs.
On behalf of the members of the committee, I thank you for being here tonight. We will now hear your opening remarks, which will be followed by questions from the senators. Mr. Laycraft, the floor is yours; welcome.
Dennis Laycraft, Executive Vice President, Canadian Cattle Association: Mr. Chair and distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear.
I’m Dennis Laycraft and I’m the Executive Vice President of the Canadian Cattle Association, and through our provincial members, we represent 60,000 beef cattle producers across Canada.
Canada’s beef farmers and ranchers play a vital role in sustainable food production and rural economic stability, both for Canadians and consumers around the world. Our sector makes a significant contribution to the Canadian economy. Last year, we contributed over $15 billion in farm cash receipts and about $40 billion overall to the Canadian economy. Between cattle production and our processing industry in the food and distribution, we also contribute close to 347,000 jobs.
Today’s study is focused on food security. For Canadian beef producers, that goes hand in hand with trade. Approximately 50% of what we produce is shipped to international markets, where producers are able to add roughly 40% extra value to each animal we produce. We exported $7 billion worth of live cattle and beef, with $6 billion of that going to the United States. While we continue to identify opportunities to diversify, we must continue to focus on the Canada-U.S. relationship.
Our sector is highly integrated, and the entire supply chain has been set up to support free trade of both live cattle and beef. Canada and the United States have the largest two-way trade in live cattle and beef in the world. Both Canadian and American small- and medium-sized processors and food systems rely on Canadian cattle to compete and to stay in business, and our integration is critical for North American food security.
There is no greater example of this integration than what occurred during the pandemic. Agriculture and agri-food were deemed essential, and our integrated supply chains were not disrupted. We should give credit where it is due, to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, or CFIA, and Canada Border Services Agency, or CBSA, for maintaining those essential services and keeping food on the shelves in the grocery stores both in Canada and in the U.S. We continue to ask that agri-food be deemed an essential service and that our ports and borders be identified as critical infrastructure to ensure food security.
In addition to trade, having a strong regulatory environment is crucial for our sector’s competitiveness. Growth is inhibited when there is regulatory divergence with the United States. We are working with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency through an appropriate regulatory and scientific pathway to remove the short list of specified risk material for Canadian processors, as this will put us on a more competitive footing with our American processors.
I will note that our cattle herd is at the lowest level in decades, and without meaningful support and policy action, we risk a further decline in domestic production, which could undermine Canada’s ability to capitalize on increased domestic and global demand for beef. Regulatory improvements, along with enhancements to programs, such as the Livestock Price Insurance and AgriStability, helping reduce barriers to growth and encouraging the next generation of producers to enter the industry are priorities. Streamlining practical regulations that support herd expansion, reduce unnecessary costs and enable producers to remain competitive will be key to meeting future demand.
We place a high priority on young producers, and those who want to join our industry face high capital costs and significant uncertainty. Targeted federal programs and modernized regulations can make it possible for the next generation to build viable cattle operations and reverse the trend of declining cattle numbers.
Canada has the capacity to produce more beef, but producers need the right tools and support to do this. In our view, the world needs more Canadian beef, and we’re excited to work with senators, members of Parliament and officials to capitalize on this opportunity.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you, Mr. Laycraft. Ms. Farrell, you now have five minutes for your remarks. You have the floor.
Kristina Farrell, Chief Executive Officer, Food and Beverage Canada: Good evening, honourable senators, and thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this important study. My name is Kristina Farrell, CEO of Food and Beverage Canada. I’m joined today by my colleague Jean-Emmanuel Poitras, Director of Policy and Regulatory Affairs.
Food and Beverage Canada is the national industry association for Canada’s domestic food and beverage manufacturers. Our members include all six of the provincial and regional food and beverage manufacturing associations, as well as companies big and small.
Food and beverage manufacturing is Canada’s largest manufacturing industry in terms of value of production and our country’s largest manufacturing employer, providing good jobs to more than 318,000 Canadians. When we talk about the health of this industry, we are talking about the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of families and the stability of food supply that Canadians rely on.
Our food and beverage manufacturers contribute far beyond production; they are pillars of food access and community well-being. Let me highlight just a few of our members. LUDA Foods is a small family-owned company that donates over 28,700 meals every year through Moisson Montréal and other food banks. Gay Lea Foods, through their partnership with Second Harvest, has contributed $1.2 million over three years, the equivalent of 5 million meals, to food-insecure households across the country. And Exceldor Cooperative has always made it a priority to support communities by donating high-quality poultry products, including a minimum of 120,000 servings each month.
These companies, and many others across the country, are vital community partners. But when facilities close, communities lose jobs, farmers lose markets, and Canadians lose reliable access to food. A strong domestic processing industry is needed if we are to be serious about food security.
Canada’s food security depends on more than how much we grow. It depends on our ability to process, package and distribute food here at home. COVID-19, recent trade policy shocks, global conflicts and both port and rail disruptions have demonstrated that without domestic manufacturing capacity, Canada is vulnerable. When a food plant closes, it rarely reopens. We cannot rely solely on imports or on an unpredictable global market to feed Canadians during a crisis.
A resilient food system requires robust domestic food and beverage manufacturing capacity. We can produce all the primary agriculture in the world, but if we cannot process it here, we cannot guarantee affordable, accessible food for Canadians during disruptions. To ensure that Canadians have access to food, we must protect and grow domestic processing capacity. We were disappointed in the absence of an announcement on a domestic food processing fund in Budget 2025, a commitment made by the Liberal Party in the last federal election.
We must modernize Canada’s regulatory system. Slow or duplicative approval processes make it harder for companies to innovate and easier for investment to flow elsewhere. We need a regulatory system that supports competitiveness while maintaining high standards for food safety.
We need to strengthen labour stability, as a skilled and reliable workforce is essential for maintaining our food supply. Foreign workers are essential to operations across the country and play a crucial role in ensuring Canada’s food security. We need not only continued access to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program but also pathways to permanent residency. We are encouraged by the proposed one-time measure for up to 33,000 work permit holders in Budget 2025 and hope this measure prioritizes workers in our plants.
Finally, in addressing competitiveness challenges, our companies operate in global markets. If Canada does not remain cost-competitive on energy, packaging, transportation and more, production will shift to other jurisdictions. Every facility lost is a permanent loss to Canada’s food security.
Food security is not only about growing food; it is about transforming it, reliably and at scale, here in Canada. It is about ensuring that if we face another pandemic, another trade disruption or another shock to global supply chains, we can continue to feed Canadians. Canada has extraordinary potential as a global food powerhouse, but to feed Canadians reliably and to support our farmers, we must ensure we have a strong, competitive and resilient food and beverage manufacturing industry.
Thank you. We look forward to your questions.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you for your comments, Ms. Farrell. Mr. Lemaire, you now have the floor.
Ron Lemaire, President, Canadian Produce Marketing Association: Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today.
Canada’s fresh fruit and vegetable sector is a cornerstone of our nation’s food security, public health and economic resilience. Agriculture and agri-food contribute over $149 billion annually to Canada’s GDP and employ more than 2.3 million Canadians. The fresh fruit and vegetable sector contributes $18.9 billion to GDP and 187,000 workers employed, making our sector one of the key economic drivers in food.
Despite its significance, agriculture and the fresh fruit and vegetable supply chain is often under-recognized compared to other sectors, even as it powers innovation, sustainability and food security from rural communities to urban centres. Our sector operates within one of the most complex food systems in the world. Fresh produce is highly perishable, requiring rapid movement from farm to table to maintain quality, safety and nutritional value. This perishability means every link in the supply chain — growers, packers, shippers, retailers and food service providers — must work in close coordination and with exceptional agility. Strong supply chains are essential to ensuring Canadians have access to fresh, affordable produce year-round. Investments in cold chain infrastructure, modern ports and efficient transportation networks are foundational to maintaining supply chain integrity and reducing food loss.
The sector’s complexity is often heightened by Canada’s reliance on both domestic production and imports from nearly 200 countries. This reflects the diversity of tastes our cultural mosaic demands within Canada. We also contend with regulatory misalignment, slow service delivery and the need for modernization across the supply chain. It is fundamental to investigate.
To overcome these, Canada must adopt a coordinated, systems-based approach, drawing on proven policy successes both domestically and internationally. Recent federal initiatives, such as the Food Policy for Canada and the passage of Bill C-280, have demonstrated the impact of targeted investment and persistent collaboration.
Community food infrastructure projects and the development of the National School Food Program can make important contributions to improved access to healthy food and reduced waste. Provincial programs like British Columbia’s Local Food Infrastructure Fund show the value of tailoring solutions to local needs.
International successes should also be looked at. Countries like Denmark and the United States have made significant strides by integrating food security into national strategies and expanding support programs. Brazil’s and India’s school feeding initiatives have improved child nutrition and supported local agriculture, while climate-smart policies in Africa have built resilience against environmental shocks — all things we need to investigate from a Canadian lens as to how we can incorporate them domestically.
The Canadian Produce Marketing Association, or CPMA, urges the government to support a strengthened food system and food security for all Canadians by prioritizing food production and access to food in legislation, policy and crisis management. CPMA recommends that the government establish an agri-food supply chain advisory council to serve as a standing forum to support cabinet in advancing a cross-departmental approach to change.
Policy directions for change could include applying a food security lens and a competitiveness lens to policy-making; I can explain more during questions. It could also include investment in domestic capacity, strengthening our labour programs, enhancing food access programs, supporting trade resilience, bolstering food safety systems and promoting the “Buy Canadian” strategy. Domestic investment in food security is key. Infrastructure, innovation, regional food hubs all play a role in driving the local food footprint across the country. The food terminal is a good example and an area we need to look at investment in.
In closing, Canada’s fruit and vegetable sector is more than an industry — it is a cornerstone, as I noted, of public health, sustainability and national resilience. By embracing a systems approach, expanding domestic production and investing in our food systems, we can ensure Canadians have reliable access to affordable nutritious produce while positioning our growers as leaders in global food security.
Thank you. I look forward to any questions you have as we move forward.
The Deputy Chair: Thank you for your opening statements.
Colleagues, being aware of the time available to us, I suggest, for the first round, that each senator be allowed five minutes, including question and answer.
Senator Sorensen: My first question Mr. Laycraft and Mr. Lemaire answered, but I’m going to re-ask it. Climate events, feed cost, transportation issues all affect the long-term availability and affordability — I started with “of beef,” but I will add fresh produce. What supports would help stabilize access to nutritious foods? You both did a great job of listing off a number of things. I want to go back — and it was something Ms. Farrell said, so if you want to jump in as well — and particularly ask about labour shortages and aging facilities. Just maybe elaborate on those two.
Mr. Laycraft, would you like to start? We are flight partners. We often fly together.
Mr. Laycraft: I’ll start with labour. We have drawn on — and I almost hate to call them “temporary foreign workers”; I prefer “international workers.” They have become an important avenue for our beef-processing plants. They have tried to hire domestically — that is their first priority every time they are out seeking employees — but these workers have become a fundamental part of our beef-processing industry.
That’s right down to the small- and medium-sized plants now, too. They face some bigger hurdles. When you are a large plant, you have an HR department doing it. When you are a small plant, you are the HR department. That’s another issue.
But we have to ensure we continue to have a stream. It is important when we bring in those employees. There will be up to a 37-week training session. You are not going to bring in people trained up to the level that we are having in our processing and food safety systems in Canada. That has been really important to do that.
I also want to make a comment on research. It came up earlier. As we deal with climate resilience and all of this, that research continues to be a fundamental part moving forward. I know you asked Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, but in this budget, there is some uncertainty as to how the A-base funding for researchers at Agriculture Canada facilities is going to be impacted. They have been very helpful as we continue to build, strengthen management systems.
I did mention some of our safety-net programs. When you have a drought or other issues, especially for young producers, those safety-net programs can be the difference between staying in business or not.
Mr. Lemaire: I want to build on the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. I know there has been a lot of discussion around what to do with the model in Canada. Within agriculture, the SAWP program is fundamental, and we encourage the Government of Canada to do no harm to the program. It is a model that is fully functional and enables Canadian growers, farmers and others within our agriculture industry to effectively grow, harvest and deliver food to Canadians. Those are jobs that Canadians don’t want, especially jobs within rural Canada, where we don’t have the workforce to recruit from. So the Temporary Foreign Worker Program under SAWP is fundamental for strategically moving forward and enabling the food security model in the long term.
On top of that, we need to look at the infrastructure discussion. We need to look at effective delivery of our highway and infrastructure and being able to look at dual lanes, enabling trucks to move from one part of the country to another in the most effective way, and spring weights. It sounds silly, but there are some provinces — and Senator Robinson knows this conversation — where you need to ensure that we have harmonization on the weights of trucks moving in the spring, because sometimes you have to stop at the border of Quebec and drop the weight so they can move through Quebec. So you are adding costs to the system, as an example.
Ms. Farrell: Chronic labour shortages, of course, as well as an aging workforce, and while the Temporary Foreign Worker Program is essential, we also have people working at our plants with expiring work permits and no pathway to permanent residency. It is not just about having enough people but about having people with the right skills and attracting those people to our industry where those jobs are, which is sometimes in rural and remote communities.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you very much.
The Deputy Chair: Well done.
Senator Muggli: I admit I’m a little distracted by the thought of a medium-rare T-bone steak at this moment, with a P.E.I. baked potato and some living lettuce on the side.
My pen has prompted this question because it is from VIDO, or the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization. Do you have any suggestions or anything you would like to add to the conversation around disease management investments that might be needed? Mr. Laycraft, would you like to start?
Mr. Laycraft: It’s interesting. Last week we did a simulation working with the entire industry and Animal Health Canada. There is an investment going into the foot-and-mouth vaccine bank. It is incredibly important that we do that and maintain that.
We continue to need to modernize all of our systems when we go through this. Biosecurity becomes an incredibly important part of this, and that starts at our ports, at our airports in particular, and maintaining the security there. But one of the fundamental things, if you are going to have a foreign animal disease program, is to maintain adequate compensation programs. You have problems around the world where foreign animal diseases get away. It is where those governments are not compensating producers that are directly impacted, so people stop reporting. In Canada, we do compensate. We are going through some issues with tuberculosis right now because our cattle value has increased at a rate higher than what the maximum compensation levels were. Those have been addressed. They should have been addressed sooner.
I go back to the fundamental of a good foreign animal disease program, which is, again, having the veterinary infrastructure and having the compensation program so that everybody participates in it and there is no avoidance.
Senator Muggli: What about on the research side?
Mr. Laycraft: Absolutely. We continue to do that. We have been trying for years, working with the research department, to get a new test for tuberculosis, as one example. It is a very slow process when you culture it. So everything we are doing there — as odd it as sounds, when you are dealing with a foreign animal disease that we haven’t dealt with for 70 years, most of our practising veterinarians have never seen it.
Senator Muggli: If you can find a veterinarian.
Mr. Laycraft: Yes. It is more than just research. It is pulling it all together, and that is where a group like Animal Health Canada plays a very important role.
Mr. Lemaire: I’ll bring up competitiveness relative to crop protection tools and the challenges we have on delays and/or extremely long wait times on review of new tools that our industry can use within the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, or PMRA. How do we look at, within a red tape reduction strategy, creating better fast tracks and acceptance of equivalency of different crop protection tools/technologies?
For example, in 2018 they began working on a drone strategy to allow our growers — and I have two growers here with me at committee — to basically target application of crop protection tools for wheats, which would allow for reduction of use of materials, more competitive and more efficient delivery of products and, in the end, make the farmer more competitive domestically and internationally. Since 2018, no work has been done, and they are saying 2027 before a model comes to the market that they can implement.
The U.S. already has this in play. We have similar wind modelling, sun modelling, terrain. Looking at the modelling in the U.S. and best practice and how we can adopt that in Canada to a Canadian framework are things we should be investigating.
Senator Muggli: There is a bill coming forward from the House on drought and flood forecasting, which is probably very important as well.
Ms. Farrell: Food safety is paramount for us, but I wouldn’t say this is necessarily our purview. I would look towards the primary producer groups — those who have already spoken.
Senator Muggli: Thank you.
Senator Robinson: Where to start? First, congratulations, Mr. Laycraft. You’ve been inducted into the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame. Fantastic.
Hon. Senators: Hear, hear.
Mr. Laycraft: I’m in some pretty good company.
Senator Robinson: That’s wonderful to see. I wanted to dive into a question under the lens of profitability and predictability and recognizing that farmers and ranchers are business people, people who expect a reasonable return on investment.
You mentioned in your opening remarks quite a bit about how hog-tied we sometimes feel about the funding that’s available in business risk management, and I’m looking now at the fact that the average age of a producer in Canada is 57. It keeps going just a little higher than my age, which I like. But, in that, we are faced with a huge turnover in succession just on the horizon.
What if we don’t succeed in having predictable profitability? We’ve heard a lot about the stress about what it means, in particular, if you’re a canola farmer in Saskatchewan, and you have to get your crops to a port, and the railways aren’t taking it, and your markets are disappearing on you — what that does in terms of driving people away from getting involved in the production of food in Canada. Could you speak to that in the lens of what it means for food security and the cost of food?
Mr. Laycraft: That’s a fairly big package.
Senator Robinson: Yes.
Mr. Laycraft: First, there is such broad diversity amongst producers. You have to create an environment in which are on a competitive level so we can compete primarily with the United States and a number of other processors. It starts with the right regulatory environment. Don’t have red tape that isn’t serving any useful purpose. Some regulations are very important.
How do we attract more young producers? We have our young leaders program. We are seeing more and more of them staying. We have safety-net programs, but look at the United States and their Livestock Price Insurance Program. For the first five years, those who are deemed young producers get premium support. They are paying less to insure, and that’s when you need the insurance the most. It is hard to get the financing.
There is that and then just having market security. We’ve been fortunate. China, in a very unjustified measure, closed us out in 2021, but we’ve seen the value of our exports continue to increase, even though we lost one of our larger customers, because we have that degree of market diversification and other close relationships. We have many good friends in the United States. I was just down there meeting with them. In the agriculture sector, they would like to see us move through this negotiation and keep the USMCA, or CUSMA, as we call it. “Do no harm” is the approach they describe.
Senator Robinson: Our beef cattle are the epitome of dual citizens, aren’t they?
Mr. Laycraft: They are. We are importing 388,000 head of feeder cattle right now, some into Ontario, some into Western Canada, because our cattle numbers are down. It has helped their prices. It has helped keep our processors operating at a high level.
I do want to make the point that our export trade actually makes food more affordable in Canada. That sounds counterintuitive, but the types of products we export to Asia are products you would not normally see on your retail counters in Canada. We are largely a steak and roast and ground beef market. They like short ribs, short plate, skirt meat, flanks, chuck rolls.
Senator Robinson: Yes, tongue, head.
Mr. Laycraft: I have seen a counter of fresh tongue for barbecue in Japan selling at a higher price than a New York strip loin. By getting a higher value there, we actually make steaks, roasts and ground beef more affordable in Canada because we distribute the value more evenly through the animal itself.
Senator Robinson: Super point. I like that.
Mr. Lemaire, would you take a moment to speak about your competitiveness and — what did you say — productivity?
Mr. Lemaire: It is very similar to the meat industry. Our greenhouse industry in Ontario is an example where 85% of the product grown is shipped to the U.S. If we kept that product in Canada, we could not eat our way out of the volume that would be in the market. But those economies of scale allow Canadians to access a better cost of food because of the volume we export and yet still have enough to produce for Canadians.
Senator Varone: What is the future of greenhouse production? I ask that because Senator McBean and I visited a greenhouse farm. You mentioned a couple of key things in your opening remarks in terms of the perishability of vegetables, fruits, leafy greens. Their comment was that they have no-touch production. Nobody touches anything. The shelf life is two months because it’s done in a cool environment; it never sees the sunlight; it can stay in your fridge for two months and still taste fresh.
The average age of their employees is not the Canadian average of 57; it is 27. And they’re all highly educated. The production capacity for every square foot of greenhouse would require 35 square feet outside. So 2 acres of greenhouse covers 80 acres of land. Is that our future? Or are we going down the wrong path because of the overproduction which that could present?
Mr. Lemaire: That’s a great question. There is a balance between how much growth we see in the greenhouse industry and our controlled-environment agriculture because there are various dynamics at play, from container growing to under-glass to shade to warehouse production.
The cue we need to look at is fit-for-purpose tools for the markets we need to service and the products we’re able to grow. When you look at the sun being free when you are growing outside, and the weather conditions in Canada only give us a certain window of production, that pushes us to look at greenhouse strategies in a more focused way.
Will it take over everything? No. That is just because of the nature of the business, how much space there is and the investment. The current investment to develop a greenhouse is not inexpensive. Going back to the tax challenges, the costs of return on investment, many greenhouse producers are looking at the Canadian market, at Mexico, at the U.S., and they’re making decisions on where they invest on growth.
In Canada, we don’t necessarily make it easy for greenhouse growers to expand their businesses. We need to look at more incentives to enable Canadian businesses to grow and also enable venture capital and private equity to invest in the businesses, because that’s where the money is now coming from, to enable us to continue to put innovations into a system, to have diversity of products and to meet the demands of Canadians.
We will see continued growth. We have to put the right tools in place at a government level, whether it is with the tax framework, a labour framework or an incentive model for expansion, as opposed to seeing that move to the U.S. and expanding in Virginia and other parts of North America.
Senator Varone: Thank you. This question is for Ms. Farrell.
Most of the food production and beverage production companies that I know are in major urban centres. Having said that, you’re competing with market value land costs and market value building costs. Those numbers have soared over the last 15 years. Many in that space have looked in the mirror and asked, “Why am I doing this when I can sell to the condo builder and just retire nicely?”
How do you negotiate with the federal government? All this federal government land is being deployed for housing but not for industry that is critical to our needs. Are you at the table, in that conversation, looking for the food and beverage production people to get involved in that?
Ms. Farrell: It is a significant issue, especially at the provincial level, having access to adequate land for food and beverage manufacturing. Not every small community wants to live beside a beef plant, just as an example. Many of our existing plants in Canada are aging. First, we need funds to ensure that we up our infrastructure. Many have equipment that is decades old.
It is extremely expensive to build a new modern-day plant, especially during a time when there is so much unpredictability. That’s why it’s so important to ensure that the plants that we do have don’t close.
Senator Varone: Are you at the table with the federal government?
Ms. Farrell: On housing as it relates to addressing —
Senator Varone: No, on their land bank.
Ms. Farrell: On their land bank? No, not currently, but our provincial associations are with the provincial governments on this topic.
Senator McBean: I love when conversations in committee — no pun intended — organically find a stream. All three of you mentioned the labour and small- and medium-sized organizations. Labour and technology have come up from my colleagues. I’m wondering about the future.
I’ll start with you, Mr. Laycraft. The very first agriculture event and conference discussion I went to was on AI and robotics. It was talking about how AI and robotics, particularly in beef processing, were going to remove the drudgery, the dangerous and the dirty from it. It was mortifying and fascinating all at the same time — de-bellying and all.
If we look at the future and protecting small- and medium-sized processing plants, because it will be harder for those organizations to bring in the robotics and such, what is the future of employment? You mentioned that 347,000 jobs in the Canadian Cattle Association include processing. What is the future of the jobs in those organizations, and what can the federal government be doing to have Canadians trained and ready for the more modern roles?
Mr. Laycraft: I thought Senator Robinson’s question was big. That is a great question.
One thing that we have found is automation in beef processing has been more difficult than in other sectors. It is a more diverse product. Parts of it are going to be automated. For instance, JBS, their whole boxing facility is, essentially, completely automated. As soon as the box leaves, it’s all sorted. They can pack it better than humans can with the software they have for shipping, whether it’s export or across the country.
We are seeing some fascinating technology that is being used for animal health purposes. You can detect if animals are showing very early signs of a change in behaviour, which is a signal that there is likely to be an animal health issue developing. The earlier you can engage on that, usually the less treatment is required.
Cattle are a bit different than pork or poultry. You would see a lot more there. The beef animal is actually the original biodigester. Its great strength is it will eat things that humans can’t and turn that into a high-value product. The native grazing lands, that’s probably our best carbon-storage system in the world.
We still see that big future out there for the typical type of production, but when you start to get down to the smaller operations, once you remove some of the regulatory barriers, I think there is going to be what I call some sort of compartmentalizing, some smaller technologies that don’t need the scale of a big plant. They are never going to compete with the total economies of scale of big plants, but we have customers who want to have local processors. That’s the beauty of having a lot of choice in our food distribution system.
Senator McBean: I remember loving having a local hardware store, but they all went out of business. I loved my local hardware store. I wish it were still there. I hate going to big-box places.
I remember they were talking about how AI was going to come in and was going to be able to even butcher cattle at one point. Mr. Lemaire, you talked about how drones are coming in, and they are going right after the weeds and such like that. Let’s accept that AI and technology are coming in. Will our workforce be able to step into those jobs when they become available? What can the government be doing with policy, looking ahead to ensure that Canadians from small and rural towns are able to stay in industries that they love?
Mr. Lemaire: There has to be a strategy with the provinces. That’s the first step. This is a boots-on-the-ground discussion. At the colleges and universities, no one thinks of agriculture. We are the forgotten industry. Everyone goes to automotive. They go to Alberta, looking at the oil patches. People forget agriculture is more than just working in the fields. The range of jobs that are available within our entire sector is quite complex. You can be an engineer or an agronomist. There are a range of opportunities.
We have to do a better job of communicating that as an industry, but also from provincial and federal levels to ensure people know there is a path to education and job security with this opportunity of embracing technology.
Senator Burey: Senator McBean, you have got me on to education. I’m not going to go there, but I would love to hear some more ideas.
I wanted to get back to the local food infrastructure and hone in on farm-to-table comments, ideas. Could you expand on that? My other question is to expand on your supply chain advisory council, one of your recommendations.
Mr. Lemaire: Starting with local food infrastructure, I want to talk about the Ontario Food Terminal. Senator McBean took the opportunity of touring the terminal this summer.
The Ontario Food Terminal feeds Canada with fresh fruit and vegetables. Currently, the local producers who are selling out of the terminal are selling out of outdoor stalls, using reefer trucks, cold storage units that are temporary. Part of what we have asked for under the current federal infrastructure spend is $125 million to build out indoor cold-chain systems. They would have indoor storage. They would be able to operate just like any of the other wholesale operators selling local products, which goes from as close as downtown Toronto to northern Ontario, to Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, all the way out to B.C. and Alberta. There are over 5,000 buyers across the country using the food terminal to access fresh fruit and vegetables locally, and, of course, also some of the imported products. That investment in a local food hub like the food terminal can drive and support farmers to find new channels to sell their products. That’s the first step.
How do we look at supporting more of a dealer model? As we look at growth and change at a local level and small farmers having to be more efficient and more focused on combining sales with their partners around the community and then finding markets for that product across the country, the labelling rules are getting more complicated, the packaging requirements, all of these things. A lot of farmers need help on how they drive that into the market. There are some strategies we need to look at to make it easier for them to move through a dealer model into a community framework to sell their wares.
Senator Burey: Thank you. Were you going to talk about the advisory council?
Mr. Lemaire: How do we bring it together? It doesn’t have to just be fruit and veg. It’s a combination of agri-food and the agri-food industry basically bringing together key stakeholders who operate right now on a very informal basis, to begin looking at advising government on how we actually put the right policy frameworks in place to enable trade, enable local food infrastructure, enable strategies that can link into the school food programs, nutrition programs, as well as developing other pieces that could link into education and other channels that are traditionally looked at through the Ministry of Agriculture.
The problem is we have siloed our sector into one department. I work with the Ministry of Agriculture, with Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, with Transport, with Finance. We are not a one-trick pony — or one-trick cow. We function across multiple jurisdictions. That is key to where this advisory council can enable more ministries to understand we are an economic engine, we can drive change in the country, we can drive employment and, at the end of the day, we feed Canadians.
Senator Burey: Thank you.
Senator Muggli: This is your opportunity to summarize. In the next three to five years, what do you see as the major threat or threats to food security in your industry, and how will Canadians experience that?
Mr. Lemaire: As I mentioned earlier, access to new, innovative tools for crop protection that are delayed because of red tape within Health Canada.
Senator Muggli: What is the biggest piece of red tape or stone in your shoe at this point?
Mr. Lemaire: The review process.
Senator Muggli: For?
Mr. Lemaire: For crop protection tools moving into the system. Companies, members of CropLife, many of them do not want to invest time and money in the Canadian market, which is only a 40-million-person market, because of the challenges they have to face. That is one step. The other step is that when we see products used in other jurisdictions and those products finding their way to Canada, you have to turn around and ask the question, “Why can’t Canadian growers use those same crop protection tools that are being used outside of the country?”
Kody Blois put forward a private member’s bill looking at alignment and harmonization of crop protection strategies, so looking at trading partners like the U.S. and how PMRA can leverage that to see how it can be done in the right science and risk models to introduce it into Canada. We need to move forward with those types of strategies to be more efficient in introducing technologies.
I do wish to talk trade quickly. In terms of predictability, which was asked about earlier, we need to ensure we have a free-trade model within our market in fresh fruit and veg. Five per cent is the margin in many cases. If we were to see our biggest trading partner implement a baseline tariff of 5% on our sector, it would wipe out many of the farms. The key is to look at ensuring CUSMA moves forward as is. Ensuring free trade at a zero-point level is key. We must ensure we have predictability with our largest trading partner. We can diversify all we want. In fresh fruit and vegetables, with the perishability, it is harder to sell to distant markets than to the second-largest market in the world, which is right next door.
Senator Muggli: Adopting products that we know work in a jurisdiction came up in the soils study as well, if I recall.
Mr. Laycraft: I echo some of those comments. Market security is incredibly important, but it is about those key markets. There are emerging markets we are negotiating with that do not have the same labour or food safety standards. When you look at trade deals, you need to look at everything so it is a level playing field. You need confidence in the future, for example, in trade.
One thing I am going to mention is time. What we find is there are a number of things that take much longer for us to get approved in Canada than our trading partners. In the U.S., they have the Agricultural Marketing Service. I will use the third-party certification example. In 2010, they started approving third-party auditors within six months to go to the European Union. They have 52 who are currently doing it. We approached the CFIA in 2017, and we are still working on number one. One of those who applied is actually certifying in the U.S.
There is a provincial issue too. You try to get a new operation approved quickly. We have an example of a biodigester that has been tied up for three years. It’s part of a solution in the U.S. They get theirs approved. It’s the same group of owners. In Texas, they got approved in 30 days.
Senator Muggli: Reminds me of hospital equipment for surgical robots I was involved in.
Ms. Farrell: I would say labour, which continues to be a perennial issue for us. We need to attract more people to the food and beverage manufacturing industry. We are facing a significant aging workforce and retirements that will make this issue even worse in the coming years.
Senator Robinson: I have to change on the fly here because you keep answering the questions I want to ask.
I would like to speak with Ms. Farrell. We have heard discussion about the Barton report, and I want to Barton, Barton, Barton about how our opportunities in Canada as far as reaching for that brass ring are to do more value addition within Canada, which is what you represent, in my opinion. What recommendations would you have for us as to how we make Canada more competitive to attract that investment? I am assuming you are going to say things like predictability of labour and all of that. I wonder if you can expand on all of that for us.
Ms. Farrell: It is ensuring we have a skilled workforce that meets our needs. We are competing against other industries to attract those skilled workers. Whenever we see a big investment in the auto industry, we are competing against that, so labour for sure.
It is also about creating a predictable investment environment. I understand that is difficult right now based on what is happening around the world. There are certain things we can do. We saw some productivity-enhancing tax credits announced in Budget 2025, which are helpful and will encourage companies to invest in their plants, machinery and equipment and to ensure they keep their investments here in Canada. We could do more, though, such as the domestic processing fund to encourage companies, again, to stay in Canada, keep their workforce here in Canada and make food here as well.
Senator Robinson: Thank you. Could any of you give me the stat? I know there’s a stat that says for every foreign worker who comes to Canada to work in agriculture, it supports a certain number of jobs.
Mr. Lemaire: We brought this up today. It’s just under three jobs.
Senator Robinson: Can you unpack what that means?
Mr. Lemaire: Let’s expand this. A temporary foreign worker comes in; it influences three additional Canadian jobs, as well as provincial and federal tax benefits, which are now suddenly flowing into our system. Those individuals are now able to make investments in our own economy. It is a trickle-down effect, but people do not think of agriculture being an influencing factor.
I return to the question of how we make Canada a food superpower. The first step is to continue to invest in all the pieces of our agricultural community, including temporary foreign workers, innovation strategies, like AI, investment within our infrastructure to get product from farm to consumer and reducing the burden of regulation on the farming community. We keep talking red tape, and it is extremely dysfunctional in many ways.
We had a great meeting with the President of the CFIA today. We had a discussion about one simple thing. If I want to ship my product to the U.S. and I’m a potato grower, I have to go get a country-of-origin certificate from the office. In this digital world, you should be able to have that certificate emailed to the exporter. They can attach it to their packaging and send it over the border instead of spending 45 minutes getting a hard copy to include with their shipment. Those are simple things we could change right away.
Senator Robinson: In our goal to become an agricultural superpower, which I think is within our reach if we really believe in ourselves, could you talk about unintended consequences? I am thinking back to hearing you once talk about the single-use plastic situation —
Mr. Lemaire: Yes.
Senator Robinson: — and how there was little understanding about how valuable the technology within that is.
Mr. Lemaire: In relation to the concept of plastics, I know it is a sensitive topic because we need to do the right thing on sustainability and manage our plastic waste. We also have to look at a systems model, and by totally banning plastic, you’re removing a tool that improves shelf life and provides protection and food safety elements to the product going to the consumer, and it provides efficiency in shipping. All of these things are vital.
Something I want to raise, and it is in play right now, is a request we have of the government to look at the plastics registry currently in place. I understand there are only a thousand companies registered. It is a duplication of efforts of capturing data that’s already captured in the EPR, or the extended producer responsibility, at the provincial level. It is a burden on industry to have to record more data into a system we don’t know will ever be used.
Those are just some of the things we need to try and address — unintended consequences.
Senator McBean: I will bring it back to a core question for Mr. Lemaire and Ms. Farrell: How can the federal government work with industry to improve access to nutritious produce in remote, northern and Indigenous communities where fresh food costs and storage are disproportionately high?
Mr. Lemaire: I will let Ms. Farrell start with that because we have been taking a lot of the time in the room.
Ms. Farrell: I’m happy to start with that. We do not have a lot of food and beverage manufacturers in the North, in particular, so it comes down to investing in our infrastructure to make sure it is more cost-efficient to transport some of our food that has longer shelf life, not necessarily on the fruit and vegetable side of things, in order to make it more cost-efficient to get food where it needs to go, in particular to rural and remote communities.
Mr. Lemaire: The other opportunity is looking at production on site. The Growcer is a container, I think he has testified. That is a good example of creating — it is not the perfect solution; you will not feed the entire community — a tool that will enable.
The other piece around that — and I totally agree on infrastructure. The North West Company is a good example of existing infrastructure in play. It is a business that delivers to the North. How are we enabling our existing partners to make them successful? That is something we need to look at.
I will give you something simple, not only in the North but in Newfoundland: the fact that we have challenges just getting fresh produce and food to Newfoundland because of challenges with the ferry system, food not being put on, whereas you get — I hate to say it — lumber or other hard goods that are not going to waste. The question is why food isn’t a priority.
Going back to a key message during your testimony, Mr. Laycraft, around making food essential, within policy and everything we do, it has to be a core element.
Senator McBean: To ensure I slide in a final question, Mr. Lemaire, you mentioned and espoused the Ontario Food Terminal quite a bit and how it ships coast to coast. Is it a win to have more of that type of facility, or is there a sweet spot? Would you like to have one in every province and territory? Do they need to be regional? How would it work to grow that out?
Mr. Lemaire: Having one major centre gives you the efficiency to move product east and west. Expansion of the existing facility would be all we need. Relative to the cost, it is quite effective and efficient to do the work right there in Toronto.
Already in other regions across the country, we have food hubs that exist; we just have to use them more efficiently and effectively.
Senator McBean: Thank you.
The Deputy Chair: There is two minutes left.
Senator Robinson: Mr. Lemaire, could you speak for two minutes?
Mr. Lemaire: Senator Sorensen mentioned that I should be able to dance, but I do not think you want to see me dance.
Mr. Laycraft: I know you do not necessarily need someone to speak for two minutes, but I was going to mention an out-of-the-box solution regarding the last question. We have producers across all of Canada, including those remote locations, and as part of our defence spending, one of the things that does qualify for that is improving our infrastructure, road systems and rail systems into those remote communities, which will be an important part of that.
If we put more investments in there, you are going to make it easier to move food in and out. You will make it easier to create more jobs in those areas, too. I am throwing that out there.
Mr. Lemaire: The trucking situation is still an issue, as are truck drivers.
Senator Varone: Payloads have increased tremendously when you are looking to that as a solution for the remote communities.
Mr. Lemaire: Possibly.
Senator Varone: We can carry weapons now that weigh more than food.
Mr. Lemaire: Right. The question is around storage in those communities. This is the other discussion around infrastructure. During the pandemic, CPMA was one of the three organizations serving the food rescue program in delivering food that wasn’t being sold in restaurants. We were accessing that food and sending it to Northern Canada and to other communities at risk.
Part of the challenge we found was that when we were trying to send food to the North, you could send as much payload as you like, but there were no storage facilities in the North to keep meat frozen or your fruit and vegetables at the right temperatures. Product would arrive and go bad. We need to look at that domestic infrastructure discussion so they can store food and make it available to the communities.
Senator Robinson: That is where Ms. Farrell comes in with her ability to ship food that has a longer shelf life.
The Deputy Chair: To the panellists, I want to thank you for taking the time to appear before us today. This was an informative session. We appreciate your contributions to our study. If there is anything more you want to send in writing, feel free to do so after tonight. We will now suspend to proceed to the in-camera portion of our meeting.
(The committee continued in camera.)