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Committee Makes Agri-Food Growth Recommendations To Ag Minister

The provincial Agri-Food Growth Steering Committee's report makes 7 recommendations to Agriculture Minister Jeff Leal.

Those recommendations were released at this week's 11th annual Premier's Summit on Agri-food.

The committee's report expresses confidence the province can build its competitive advantage as a long-term global leader in food production for domestic and international consumption.

Among it's recommendations on how to do that, working with the industry to create sub-sector measurement systems.

The committee suggests those systems could measure progress towards increasing the competitiveness of a sector relative to competitive and comparable jurisdictions.

Another recommendation is that the province and industry partner to champoin the importance of food processing at the Agriculture Ministers' Federal, Provincial, Territorial meetings and make it a priority area for Growing Forward 3.

The committee also made some export-related recommendations - including working with the federal government and other provinces to differentiate Canadian products from those of our competitors and working with the private sector to both increase exports and replace agri-food imports coming into Ontario.

The provincial Agri-Food Growth Steering Committee was co-chaired by Amy Cronin and Deb Stark.

Made up of industry and government leaders and exports, the committee was appointed last year to come up with recommendations for the growth of Ontario's agri-food sector.

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