The Farm Products Council of Canada has scheduled public hearings for Calgary and Montreal in 2016 on the proposed national pork promotion and research agency.
The sessions will be in Calgary Jan. 19 and Montreal Feb. 16. The council has been collecting written submissions for the last few months on the proposal for an agency that would replace provincial bodies across the country and be funded through an estimated $2 million a year in levies on farmers and imported pork and pork products.
Gary Stordy, spokesman for the Canadian Pork Council, welcomed the hearings, saying they will allow any objections to the current proposal to have a full airing while keeping the plan moving ahead. “Our provincial associations and pork producers across the country have been fully briefed on what the proposal entails.”
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FPCC had no comment on what it had been told in the submissions.
Once it has finished its review, it will recommend to Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay whether to proceed with the creation of the agency.
A similar agency, Canada Beef, already exists for the cattle sector.
In a notice to the industry, the council says it needs to determine the level of support for the agency, its effect on farmers and importers, how the levies would be collected and what powers the agency should have.
The pork council submitted the proposal at the end of July after several years of pulling it together, says Stordy.
“The objectives of the national agency will centre on promoting the consumption of pork products in the domestic market, furthering development of export markets for Canadian pork and supporting the conduct of scientific-technical and market research initiatives. These objectives are intended to strengthen markets for hogs and pork, optimize production efficiencies, increase domestic consumption and enhance financial returns from the marketplace to the benefit of participants across the Canadian pork value chain.”
Pork producers in nine provinces already fund market promotion, development and research activities. While these efforts have been successful, “the increasing complexity of the issues impacting the sector, their interwoven nature and the escalating cost of addressing these concerns mean that a more strategic, co-ordinated approach is required.”
A national agency would be better able to fund domestic and export market promotion initiatives as well as increased “animal science and technical research aimed at improving production efficiencies and competitiveness of pork in domestic and foreign markets.”
The council said the agency would be able to better explain to consumers issues such as animal nutrition, animal welfare, quality assurance, animal health and environmental impact.
CPC notes that, “Over the past five (5) years (2010-14) Canada imported 198,000 tonnes of pork and pork products on average per annum. Live hog imports averaged a mere 2,600 head per annum over this same period, but could increase in future with given improvements to the U.S. animal health status.”
It said importers also stand to gain from a more concerted effort to grow the Canadian market. As a result, they should play a contributory and participatory role in the planning and direction of promotion and research initiatives.”
