Agriculture committee  Thank you for the question. I understand the goal of creating incentives to stop, as you mentioned. The cost of doing nothing is that bad behaviour could continue if the incentives aren't there. As a parent, I will say I believe in incentives. I think the main message I want to leave you with is about a true partnership.

Agriculture committee  Thank you for that question. It would be tremendously important to have the exemption that was originally in place be reinstated before the modifications to the bill are made. A full exemption on inputs like natural gas for heating purposes would be the equivalent of tens of millions in financial relief.

Agriculture committee  Yes, that's correct. The figures I'm quoting are compiled by the Ridgetown Campus of the University of Guelph. That's based on real data gathering of prices experienced by farmers.

Agriculture committee  Absolutely. The extra costs essentially are absorbed by farmers. Farmers obviously always try to pass on costs wherever they can. If you absorb every additional cost, obviously every additional cost would become a red figure in your books. Let's say that 75% are able to be passed on.

Agriculture committee  Absolutely. I don't want to venture too far into the details, but for our sector, inputs include not just things like fertilizer and diesel, but also crop protection products. I would say a holistic approach that includes everything that's needed to successfully grow fruits and vegetables in this country would include the items you've listed, and it would also include things like crop protection products, because it's so critical to our industry to have those inputs as well.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Perron. Just to set the expectation clear, I don't think we're looking at changing or lowering the standards. That's not the message I want to convey. There is no simple answer, but I'll offer that the European model is that they view their agricultural system as having a social contract with their government, and for every layer of additional expectations that is imposed on their domestic farming sector, there is a green portion of the funding, the green pillar of farm support funding, that the European government makes available to its farmers.

Agriculture committee  I don't want to pretend to be an expert. I would be worried about Ron telling me.... He just came from Europe, and he would tell me that I'm wrong. I happen to have anecdotal information that they have high standards, for example, on genetically engineered content, and I imagine they have pretty rigorous standards on other aspects of what goes into their domestic food consumption system, but I don't want to speculate.

Agriculture committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. It is a pleasure to present to this committee today, and it's icing on the cake that I get to do it with Ron. It's good to see everyone. My name is Stefan Larrass. I'm the chair of the business risk management working group at the Fruit and Vegetable Growers of Canada.