Moved:

That the thirteenth report of the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, entitled Critical Ground: Why Soil is Essential to Canada’s Economic, Environmental, Human, and Social Health, deposited with the Clerk of the Senate on June 6, 2024, be adopted and that, pursuant to rule 12-23(1), the Senate request a complete and detailed response from the government, with the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food being identified as minister responsible for responding to the report, in consultation with the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources.

She said: Honourable senators, today I have the honour and pleasure of presenting to you and to all Canadians Critical Ground: Why Soil is Essential to Canada’s Economic, Environmental, Human, and Social Health, which is the result of our committee’s two-year study into the state of soil health in Canada.

I could try to impress you with numbers by telling you that we heard from more than 150 witnesses and received more than 60 written briefs. I could tell you that we heard from farmers, ranchers, producers, foresters, agronomists, economists, environmental groups and soil scientists of every type imaginable, including experts in soil biology, soil geology, soil mapping, soil data analysis and soil pollution and remediation.

We learned about everything from the state of Canada’s primordial permafrost to the latest developments in gene editing to increase crop yields and reduce the need for fertilizers and herbicides. We learned about traditional Indigenous agriculture techniques and the role of satellite and artificial intelligence technology in precision agriculture.

We learned about compost and earthworms, heavy metal toxicity, the threat of microplastics and the vital roles of grassland grazing and agri-forestry in sequestering carbon and mitigating climate change.

We heard from expert witnesses and government representatives from all 13 provinces and territories, as well as from the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia and New Zealand.

Our committee visited the University of Guelph, the University of Saskatchewan, Olds College of Agriculture & Technology and the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum, along with a half‑dozen farms and ranches in three provinces.

Senators Black and Cotter had the opportunity to take part in the 2022 World Congress of Soil Science in Glasgow. Senators Black, Oh and I had the privilege of attending the Eleventh Plenary Assembly of the Global Soil Partnership hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome. At that UN conference, we had the remarkable chance to meet with soil experts, farmers and advocates from nations ranging from Thailand to France, to Türkiye, to Ghana, to the Dominican Republic.

In short, we dug deep. We plowed new paths, and this groundbreaking report is the result of all that passion and all that research. We released it to coincide with the fortieth anniversary of the Sparrow report, also known as Soil at Risk, a landmark report which the Senate published in June of 1984.

Our new report has 25 recommendations. It starts by asking the government to declare Canadian soil a strategic national asset, to appoint a national soils advocate and to work with provinces, territories, Indigenous governments and the agriculture and forestry industries to establish a national soils institute and database. But there are more granular, nitty-gritty recommendations, too, about everything from standing up trustworthy carbon markets to improving public education at every level about the essential importance of soil to Canada’s economy and to our environmental, human and social health.

We want this report to be a call to action for government, but even more than that, we want it to be a call to action for Canadians. We didn’t just write the report for you, my fellow senators. We didn’t just write it in order to induce a response from the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food or the Minister of Environment and Climate Change or the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, although we look forward to hearing from all of them. No, we wrote this report to inspire everyone in Canada who wants to fight climate change, everyone in Canada who wants to clean up pollution and, perhaps most importantly, every Canadian who wants a secure and reliable supply of healthy, affordable, delicious homegrown food.

I want to thank all the members of the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry past and present for their committed and enthusiastic work on this report. I want to thank all of our witnesses and all of our dedicated staff. But most of all, I want to thank our chair, Senator Rob Black, for his passion, leadership and generosity of spirit, which made this report possible.

Thank you and hiy hiy.