Hon. Tony Loffreda: Minister Bibeau, welcome to the Senate. Ukraine is known as Europe’s breadbasket, and the war in Ukraine has many concerned. To what extent can Canada compensate for the lack of global wheat supply caused by this war? Are you having or undertaking discussions on this matter with your European and global counterparts and our wheat producers? As we know, after Russia, Canada is the largest wheat exporter in the world.

Hon. Marie-Claude Bibeau, P.C., M.P., Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food: Thank you. Absolutely. I was at the G7 about two weeks ago in Germany with my counterparts, and the Minister of Agriculture of Ukraine was with us, so we had the opportunity to listen to him and understand all the challenges that they are going through in the agricultural sector, such as seeing their agricultural infrastructure, transportation and storage, for example, being attacked, some fields having mines and not having access to the ports.

What can we do? We are obviously working with the industry, and what we expect right now is to see our Canadian wheat producers produce about 7% more. You know that these decisions are often made in the fall. Our producers prepare their coming season during the fall, they buy the inputs and have some rotational patterns that they have to follow. But still, if Mother Nature is with us, we expect to have about 7% more than in a regular year to contribute and avoid a wheat shortage, particularly for those countries who need it most.

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