HALIFAX, TUESDAY, MAY 27, 2003
STANDING COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
9:00 A.M.
CHAIRMAN
Mr. James DeWolfe
MR. CHAIRMAN: I think I will call the Standing Committee on Resources to order. Today we are very pleased to look into the Nova Scotia wine strategy. I can speak for not only myself but at least two of my colleagues around this table - and I won't mention any names - how proud we are of the Nova Scotia wines. We are great ambassadors of Nova Scotia wines, by the way, and Nova Scotia, I know, has some 20 wineries and we are very pleased that they have done so well when they competed in Europe this year.
So having said that and without further ado, I'm going to just turn your attention to Andrew Barker. Andrew is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. I'm going to ask Andy to introduce his team.
MR. ANDREW BARKER: Mr. Chairman, good morning to you and to the other members of the committee. As the chairman has mentioned, my name is Andy Barker and I am the President of the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. I would like to just take a minute maybe to introduce the people at this end of the room. Starting on my far right, Mr. Jim Gray is the President of the Grape Growers Association. Next to him is Mr. Doug Corkum who is the President of the Winery Association of Nova Scotia and as well I have two colleagues with me this morning from the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. Mark Saunders is our Vice-President of Purchasing and Distribution and does a lot of work with the local wineries and the Farm Winery Policy Monitoring Committee which is the main body that works together with the local wineries. Greg Beaulieu is our Acting Corporate Secretary and as well is very much involved with the wine monitoring committee. So we have brought with us the people who are involved primarily with the industry from the NSLC.
As you are aware, the NSLC became a Crown Corporation in August 2001 and at that time a new board of directors and a new chairman were appointed.
1
MR. CHAIRMAN: Maybe if I could just stop you there. I just wanted to do the introductions first before we go any further and I was hoping that perhaps a member from the Liberal caucus would have arrived in the meantime. Failing that, I think in all fairness, we should go around the table and just introduce ourselves, starting with you, Dave.
[The committee members introduced themselves.]
MR. CHAIRMAN: Sorry for interrupting you.
MR. DOUG CORKUM: He was on a roll too.
MR. CHAIRMAN: You were on a good roll but we like to get that in for the record. Please continue.
MR. BARKER: Just very briefly, as I mentioned, the NSLC became a Crown Corporation in August 2001 and at that time a new board of directors and a new chairman were appointed. At the same time, the NSLC developed and adopted what we call a five-point mission statement which really is there to guide and focus the operations of our business going forward. Now a key tenet of those five points is to support the economic development of the beverage alcohol industry in Nova Scotia. So we have a key tenet as part of our mission to work very closely with the local grape growers and with the winery association to grow that industry going forward.
The NSLC is very pleased to have worked closely with the local industry on a variety of committees to further industry development, marketing and product distribution. We look forward to continuing to work with the industry representatives going forward and certainly appreciate the opportunity to speak with all of you today.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you and I just want to mention that Dr. Jim Smith has joined us from the Liberal caucus and we're very pleased to have you here. (Interruption) Now, who would like to continue, Doug or Jim?
MR. CORKUM: I will let Jim go next because he's the grape grower and I think the main emphasis is the wine industry.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, Jim, we will be delighted to hear about the grape growing industry in the province. Please, continue.
MR. JIM GRAY: I will give you just a very, very quick background on the industry. Last winter, as many of you are likely aware, was a very severe one and the coldest one we've had for awhile. We did end up with significant winter damage in vinifera hybrids. However, overall, the health of the vines through the winter was very, very good and we're looking forward to another excellent year.
As for our concerns so far, fortunately, we've been in a position in which we have not asked for government handouts. We're not looking for handouts for our industry and, in general, the drought that we have experienced in some of the past years has not acted greatly on the grape growing industry. Grapes tend to love heat and the subsoil moisture in Nova Scotia, the plants normally do extremely well during the winter and grape vines are extremely deep-rooted and the roots will go down and find the moisture that they need. So we're not looking for government handouts to satisfy water needs.
Our concern really at this point in time is how to correctly verify the tonnage that is picked or delivered or crushed at the wineries and so far no system has been put in place in order for that verification to take place. It's not so much that we suspect that there is any cheating going on, but I think it behooves us all to keep - we not only have to be honest, we have to appear to be honest.
We don't have as yet a precise reckoning of the tons per acre of each variety. A survey was conducted last fall through the Farm Winery Policy Monitoring Committee and the results of that survey have not yet been completely tabulated and we're hoping that when that is completed, we will have a good handle on the amount of grapes that we're getting per acre per variety and this is important as a base so that a specific winery, if they claim suddenly that they're getting 8 tons to the acre of Marechal Foch and the industry average is 2.5 tons or 3 tons, obviously there's something that's amiss. So that data is important to us and it is important that we get that completed and it's important that we have some way of verifying the tonnage at the winery, but basically those are our major concerns at the present point.
[9:15 a.m.]
MR. CHAIRMAN: Do you have anything you want to add with regard to the winery association?
MR. CORKUM: When I got this request of what's the connection between growing grapes and resources, you know, I realized that growing grapes was a renewable resource which is unusual. So I think we're in a great industry. I think we're on the brink of a great opportunity. I must say that having Andrew Barker, Mark Saunders and Greg Beaulieu to work with us is like a breath of fresh air. We've achieved a lot since Andy has come on board. We're in the Farmers' Market, we're in the cruise ships at Pier 21, and our door is being opened to all kinds of events throughout the province where we can sell directly. Most of the problems that we encounter when trying to broaden the scope of our access to market is when we get the free trade GATT people, and then it's like smokescreens and mirrors, you never know where you're going to go. So if any of you can be of any help in dealing with GATT and free trade, please talk to me as soon as you can.
The industry is growing. We have four grape wineries and two fruit wineries at the moment, and there is another one opening in LaHave this year, there are two more opening
in Gaspereau, these are grape wineries. There is the potential of a winery down in Aylesford, where the cranberry bog is looking at possibly getting into the business. I just think that the province is looking at an opportunity of an industry that has lots of room to grow and has the people who have an interest in making it happen, including the government officials we have dealt with. It's been impressive in my opinion.
I don't know what you want me to tell you about the industry or whether you want me to just let you ask questions. There are a few things that are happening. Currently, as an industry, as opposed to in the past when we've only looked as individual wineries, we've looked at doing joint evaluations of marketing and marketing strategies. That should be happening in the very near future. We would ask you to look at the possibility of putting a tax on wine kits. I think you're losing a great source of revenue and creating a lot of opposition for both Andy and myself in the home wine industry. It would seem to me there is an opportunity to get revenue, by government, from that source.
Mr. Chairman, I don't know how much more you want me to blabber on here, but you stop me when you want or ask me whatever questions you want.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Doug, if you like, perhaps this is a good time just to go to the floor and see what develops. I speak for myself when I say this is going to be quite a learning experience for me. I am very much looking forward to the outcome of this meeting. Perhaps we will move right along. Bill Langille, you have indicated you would like to start off.
MR. WILLIAM LANGILLE: Mr. Chairman, actually the questions I was going to ask - I just got sidestepped here for a minute on your last comment, the thing about the government putting tax on wine kits. I don't make wine myself, however, I do know quite a few people who do. There are quite a few bottles given away, or at cost recoverable. I guess my question would be to both of you, putting that into perspective, how much business do the homemade wine kits cut into the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation and the wine growers?
MR. CORKUM: I have no idea. I just know that at the market, about every person who goes in and buys a bottle of wine says they make their own. I have no way of measuring what the actual volume is.
MR. BARKER: Sorry, I thought we might have a percentage. It's very small, but I don't have a number for you. I could certainly get one, though, for the committee.
MR. LANGILLE: When you say very small, it's been my observation, and of the people I know, that more and more people are making homemade wine, and more and more people are obviously drinking more wine than they were 20 years ago. We all know that. I think it might be a lot larger than one might anticipate on these homemade kits. When you say a tax, what type of a tax are you looking at?
MR. CORKUM: Well, you collect an excise tax on our product. Everything we sell has an excise tax. There's no excise tax, to my knowledge, on wine kits.
MR. MARK SAUNDERS: The HST would be the only tax.
MR. CORKUM: Yes, but you get that on ours too.
MR. CHAIRMAN: I would just like to mention that if anyone is speaking from the back, please go up to the mic for the record, because it's being recorded.
MR. SAUNDERS: At this point, the only tax on wine kits would be the 15 per cent HST. There has been talk about a further tax or markup on these kits, but there hasn't been anything to date. If there was, it is felt that it would be a fixed or kind of a flat tax on these kits as opposed to a variable.
MR. LANGILLE: Going on this theme, would it not be possible through the retailers to find out the volumes that they sell? There must be some way to track this, that's where I'm coming from. I would think that the Crown Corporation would be very interested in tracking this. I think it's a huge business, personally. I think we might be surprised at just how big it is. Having said that, I wasn't going to go there, but that was a good input.
Getting into the grapes, for the wine producing in Nova Scotia, do you grow all your own grapes or do you still import grapes for your wine?
MR. CORKUM: I think I should try to clarify that a little bit. We, under the rules, are allowed to import 25 per cent after the year 2005. Right now we're about 65 per cent requirement to have local grapes. We invariably try to bring in the juice to make up - we try to bring in the varieties that we grow here so that there's continuity in what's coming in. We're not trying to bring in varieties that we can't grow and develop a market and then find ourselves unable to fill that market because of requirements of content. So, yes, we bring in juice.
The problem is trying to bring in red juice. It's really difficult because it's transported on the skins and things happen to it when it's coming in, as opposed to white juice which is merely kept refrigerated and contained that way. So, the answer to your question is, we bring in juice for white grapes and we may have to bring in finished wine for red grapes to make up that 25 to 35 per cent. It escalates at the rate of 5 per cent a year until it reaches 75 per cent Nova Scotia content in the bottle.
I'm going to clarify that a little bit more by saying that only applies to the product that's being sold at retail. Farm wineries or wineries under the Farm Winery Policy are selling product to Andy, but they're not required to have any more content in their wine that they
sell through the liquor store than is Andrés. It's only the wine that's sold directly at retail that the content requirement is there.
MR. LANGILLE: Just one more question - I have quite a few questions, but I want to move on to my colleague - and that's regarding retail space in the liquor stores. Are you satisfied with the display that Nova Scotia has in the liquor store? Also, where your display is located within the liquor store, are you getting exposure?
MR. CORKUM: My problem is personally - I can't speak to that too, Bill, because I'm not in the liquor store. Mr. Chairman, I came here today knowing that some of these questions could not be answered by me, but I understand you're going to have a tour of the wineries. Is that correct? At that time you'll have access to the people who are selling wine wholesale to the Liquor Corporation.
Our problem is that I don't think there's very much Nova Scotia wine being sold in the liquor stores. That's where they have the 75 per cent content in the bottle. I can't do it because I can't sell wine at what they can afford to pay me and keep it within the market bracket that people will pay for this product. The cost of producing it is - I can't make any money.
MR. LANGILLE: So you sell out of your warehouses?
MR. CORKUM: I sell directly out of the store. I sell at the Farmers' Market on Saturday morning, I sell at special events and I sell at retail. I would dearly love to sell this man some of my product, but by GATT and free trade, he cannot give me a preferred markup in his store. It's against the GATT and free trade agreement to give any preferential treatment to a local winery that you can't offer worldwide - am I right on that? Okay, so in order for me to make wine, I would either have to water it down or reduce my cost in the bottle in some way that I could compete. I can't do that, my wife won't allow me to put water in the bottle, so I have a problem.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you. Before we move on, yes, Jim.
MR. GRAY: I'd just like to expand on one point you made, sir. Insofar as the wine kits are concerned, we also are well aware that there are certain ethnic groups, especially within the Halifax-Dartmouth area, that import large quantities of grapes directly and use those to make homemade wine. To somehow develop an excise tax for that is going to be almost impossible because you're importing a food item.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, gentlemen. I just wanted to introduce John MacDonell from the NDP caucus who just arrived. Mr. Hendsbee, you're next.
MR. DAVID HENDSBEE: First of all, good morning to everyone here. I had the distinct pleasure of going on a Nova Scotia Grape Growers Association vineyard tour about three and a half years ago. It certainly was an eye-opening experience to see at that point the state of the industry and what has progressed since that time to today. But I think there are opportunities for a lot more growth yet to come.
The concerns that were brought to my attention at that time were access to markets, access and presence in the liquor stores, as well as access to bottles. With regard to the access to bottles and the problem with the RRFB with regard to returning bottles, normally the policy is any wine bottles returned to the Enviro-Depots must go back for crushing and moulded into new bottles, whereas the home wine kits, and beer kits too, the people are actually going to the RRFB depots and buying the bottles from the depots and taking them home, washing them out and reusing them. What problems have the farm wineries had with regard to access to bottles or do they have their own bottle-washing machine capacity or what limitations do you have?
MR. CORKUM: To the best of my knowledge, there is no farm winery recycling bottles. None. It is a problem - it is a problem that there's only one glass producer in Canada Dominion Glass and Consumers were combined by the federal government on the basis that they could do a better job and give a better price because of size. That hasn't proven true to us, as a small winery. It may prove true in the case where you're buying tractor-trailer-loads. It's a real problem.
It's a problem in the small farm wineries. With the volume, it's hard to even buy and ship out of Europe, because you're dealing with a container-load at a time. I know that Grand Pre is buying in Europe, I know that Hans Christian is buying by tractor-trailer loads, but the smaller wineries are trying to piggyback on other winery contracts because with Dominion Glass, you have to contract for x number of bottles per year in order to get a price. That's way beyond the needs of any small winery. It would be interesting, in my opinion, to survey some of the smaller wineries in Ontario to see what they're doing, because it is a problem. Absolutely, positively, a problem.
[9:30 a.m.]
MR. HENDSBEE: Now with the wine bottles and all these different marketing ploys in regard to the shape and stuff like that, there's also a universal, standard wine bottle, is there not? Would that not be an opportunity for the Enviro-Depots, where we could have a recycling program, perhaps, the farm winery industry could possibly have access? Is there a problem with regulations in regard to these bottles?
MR. CORKUM: Not to my knowledge. To the best of my knowledge, somebody, and I can't think of his name, has been, for 10 years, trying to develop a recycling centre for beer and wine bottles in Nova Scotia, without success. Why he has not had success, I don't know.
To me, somebody should be looking at recycling them, but I'm not the expert. I have difficulty in knowing the rationale for doing it or the reasons why you shouldn't be doing it. It certainly should be investigated in my opinion.
MR. HENDSBEE: Well, from time to time we see the breweries advertising to bring back your empties because there is a bottle shortage and they want to bottle more product. They publicly advertise to bring the bottles in. I was hoping that might be an avenue, that the Liquor Corporation could work with the farm winery industry as well as with the RFBs and Enviro-Depots to try to encourage the recycling and reuse of wine bottles, instead of either shipping them off to be re-crushed and re-moulded, or is it a problem that people are buying them for their own home production?
MR. CORKUM: My understanding, at one point in the process, was that - I am not sure who is running the consumers, I think it's Consumers Glass - they refused to use more than 10 per cent recycled glass in a new bottle, which left one pile of bottles around for other uses. The beer industry, I don't have much knowledge about the beer industry, I do have some about the soft drink industry. I know that bottle washers were specific to certain types of bottles, so you couldn't put a wine bottle in a beer bottle washing machine. They go on, flip over and get washed, so the size and shape of a bottle, I think, is relevant to a particular bottle washer. I am not sure of that, but that was my experience in the soft drink industry.
MR. HENDSBEE: Could I ask the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation, in regard to the product listings, how many products are currently listed on the shelves of the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation, Nova Scotia wine products?
MR. BARKER: Just to clarify the question, is it the number of products or the number of products including sizes?
MR. HENDSBEE: Both.
MR. BARKER: Because a number of products come in a lot of different sizes. It's a bit of a guess, but I would guess about 50 different products are listed right now. It does change over time, obviously.
MR. HENDSBEE: In regard to the boxed wines, the 5-litre boxes or the 4-litre boxes and sometimes the 20-litre boxes, I know that you can order certain products from the wineries directly for B & B or restaurant use, but I found that going to the liquor stores, those boxed wines are Ontario products. I was wondering, I know there are Nova Scotia products available in those sizes, why are they not available on the shelves for the public here?
MR. SAUNDERS: Maybe if you could clarify the size of those boxes?
MR. HENDSBEE: The 5-litre boxes.
MR. SAUNDERS: The Liquor Corporation is not allowed to sell any box over 4 litres, and that's because of federal packaging legislation. The farm wineries currently have large boxes that they can retail to the licensee trade for bottling of just glasses of wine at the table, but the packaging, in core size agreement through the federal government, will not allow anything over the 4-litre box.
MR. HENDSBEE: I may have my size or dimensions wrong. If it is the 4-litre box you have, Ambience and a few other wines in the boxes on the shelves at the liquor stores, why can we not get a Nova Scotia boxed wine?
MR. SAUNDERS: I think that's a question of the wineries. Certainly if our local farm wineries offered 4-litre sizes, then we would entertain those as listing applications.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Can I just jump in a second, just for clarification purposes, Mr. Hendsbee. I do believe, Mark, that Jost produces a 4-litre box of wine. I know they produce 20-litre boxes, but I think they also have some of their product in 4-litre boxes.
MR. SAUNDERS: In 4-litre boxes, yes, and . . .
MR. CORKUM: Excuse, Mr. Corkum, I think it is 5-litre and I think that may be the problem. We have a 5-litre box . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, maybe it is a 5-litre.
MR. CORKUM: . . . it's the same shape and looks like the same size.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes, okay. I have seen them.
MR. CORKUM: Ours are 5-litre and 20-litre.
MR. SAUNDERS: As a matter of fact, that's interesting because our private wine stores that are starting up have looked to list 5-litre and the 10-litre boxes of wine and where we license them, we have to say that they are prohibited from doing that because of the federal legislation.
MR. HENDSBEE: What would it take to change the federal regulations? Instead of them trying to go through the changing of packaging and marketing and all that other stuff in regard to the assembly of these boxes, it would be easier to change the legislation with the stroke of a pen to add one litre than it is to change all the machinery and packaging.
MR. SAUNDERS: Yes, unfortunately, it's not that easy to change federal policy and guidelines. You can get into some pretty heavy red tape there, but I don't disagree. I mean
the more consumer sizes available and more selection, the better, but that is the impediment right now.
MR. HENDSBEE: Well, my only concern is if there is an impediment because of this regulation, then why are they allowed to produce the 5-litre box in the first place. If that regulation requires they can't distribute more than a 4-litre box, then why are they allowed to produce a 5-litre box?
MR. SAUNDERS: Well, they do produce them, but that size is for licensee sales, for restaurants, hotels, where wine is served by the glass.
MR. HENDSBEE: I have some other questions later on, sir. I will pass my time.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Doug, you're on the same topic.
MR. CORKUM: Well, it's just that I wasn't aware of this. I wasn't aware of the federal regulation on the size of a box and I'm sure our industry is small enough and flexible enough to be able to adapt because if it's just a matter of getting a 4-litre bag instead of a 5-litre bag and put it in the same box, I'm certainly going to make this information available to the industry because I wasn't aware of it. We make a 5-litre box and you can buy it in our store, you can buy it at the farm market, but you can't buy it in the liquor store and I wasn't aware that four was the magic figure by federal regulation, but thanks, I will pass that on.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Interesting. (Interruption) Yes, a good point made there. I guess now Mrs. Baillie, and I just want to mention for your information that two members here, Jim Smith and Mrs. Baillie, will be leaving, retiring from government, and so we're going to miss not only their committee work, but also their legislative work. Both are very fine individuals and I can say that from my experience working with them over the years. (Interruptions) Mrs. Baillie.
MRS. MURIEL BAILLIE: It's a poor day when you don't learn something.
MR. CORKUM: I've got to learn something every day. I can't go to sleep at night if I don't learn something.
MRS. BAILLIE: I live about 14 miles from the Jost Winery and I have been wondering, but I haven't asked, how does one get into the grape growing? Are there many grape growers in Nova Scotia, or just certain parts? I know Jost, they grow grapes also, but is it hard to get into grape growing?
MR. CORKUM: No, it is not hard to get into grape growing and the first step is to determine whether the area you have is qualified by virtue of weather records. First of all, you've got to know when the late and early frost is and if you're in a frost-free area for a
certain period of time, you can grow grapes there. Most of the areas that are better for growing grapes in Nova Scotia are micro-climates and not necessarily large in size and you usually create it by some little phenomenon within the area. Ours is by the Avalon River, Jost is by the gulf stream that flows up, Gaspereau is another one, but there are areas in Nova Scotia where I would never attempt to grow grapes, but some of that information is available in the Department of Agriculture.
My personal advice to people wanting to grow grapes is if you have a piece of land, you buy about a dozen plants, 10 or 11 different varieties, put them in the ground for one season to see what happens, and I will stand by that advice to anybody because until you know the area and when the early and late frost is and how much heat units you're getting through the growing season, don't invest a lot of money, but if you have an area that's conducive to those situations, call up, buy some vines, put them in the ground and you're in business. I can tell you, because I have the experience personally, and Jim Gray is one of them, you can put eight to ten acres of grapes in and do it as a hobby.
MRS. BAILLIE: I'm looking for something to do when I retire.
MR. CORKUM: It's better than golf because I got very frustrated with golf, I enjoy it out in the vineyard.
MRS. BAILLIE: Thank you, I'll look into that.
MR. GRAY: A rule of thumb - if apples are grown commercially in the immediate vicinity, you can grow hybrid grapes. If peaches will grow in the vicinity, you can grow the vinifera hybrid. Okay, that's sort of a rough rule of thumb. But remember, the biggest requirement that the grape wants is a soil that is not wet. They hate wet feet.
MRS. BAILLIE: I've got that.
MR. GRAY: Well drained, good sandy loam. It doesn't have to be that rich. A south facing slope is ideal.
MRS. BAILLIE: Okay, thank you.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Jim, just while you're on the floor, if I might jump in, I'm just curious about the ice wines. That's an area that's catching fire in Nova Scotia - when you go to functions, you get presented with ice wine as gifts for Christmas. I'm just wondering where we stand with regard to ice wine. Is that something that you're getting into?
MR. GRAY: Myself, I don't have the proper type of grape. You need a specific type of grape for ice wine. It's the type of grape that will hang for a long time after the normal
picking time. It normally is a very thick-skinned grape so it won't split and desiccate or that the wasps won't put their stinger in and suck all the juice out.
MR. CORKUM: We tried twice, we produce an ice wine but we buy the juice from a grower further down the Valley. The reason for that is, our little area is not conducive to getting three to five days of consecutive cold weather before the middle of January. But further down the Valley they get that colder weather and so we buy the juice to make the ice wine from a grower further down the Valley.
We find that in our area they freeze, thaw, freeze, thaw and then drop to the ground. They don't get that three or four days of consecutive cold weather you need to produce an ice wine.
MR. GRAY: You need that -8C while you're picking and pressing the grapes in order to form enough ice to concentrate the juice enough in order to get the sugars high enough to make ice wine.
MR. CHAIRMAN: I see. Howard, you're next, please.
MR. HOWARD EPSTEIN: In the Industry Vision document dated Spring 2002, there are a couple of statements I wanted to ask about. In the section marked Our Challenges, there's one statement that says, "NS has a high cost of production per acre." Mr. Gray, since it seems from elsewhere in the document that the land is suggested as being not expensive compared with Ontario land, why are you saying it has a high cost of production per acre? Is it just because you can't get large enough acreages?
MR. GRAY: No. Basically, in Nova Scotia it has to do with the length of the growing season and the heat units. The heavier you crop a vine (Interruption)Yes, the tonnage per acre. If I crop my Marechal at eight tons an acre, I'd end up with a Brix reading of around 16, which would be very difficult to make a good wine out of. If I crop it at three and a half to four tons an acre, I can get a 19 Brix; a really fruity wine. Anybody who's had Doug's rosé will attest, it also makes a lovely rosé, a lovely, fruity, crisp wine. The difficulty is that at a certain point, if I have too heavy a crop load, the frost will come before the grapes get ripe. Therefore, the tonnage I get per acre is lower than what they can get in Ontario because the heat units are greater and their growing season is longer.
MR. EPSTEIN: There are two other points about quality. One of the items on the list is there's a lack of defined quality standards and then the next one is, "National wine standards could impose huge costs on NS industry." So, can you tell me, are there national wine standards that are in the process of being developed?
MR. GRAY: Yes, there are.
MR. EPSTEIN: On the other one, a lack of defined quality standards. You mean, there is no Nova Scotia standards? Are you suggesting it would be desirable to have provincial rather than national standards? I'm not sure what we're being told here.
MR. GRAY: Doug, do you want to handle this?
[9:45 p.m.]
MR. CORKUM: There is a national vintners alliance that is trying to establish standards for Canadian grapes and they're being primarily controlled by the major industry in Ontario, and B.C. and Nova Scotia and Quebec are sort of opposing what's trying to happen at the federal level. We believe (Interruption) Yes, sorry. Well, Ontario, but at the national level, that's where they're trying to establish this. We are very active in having Nova Scotia standards established and approved by the Nova Scotia Government in advance of them having anything done at the federal level and on the basis that we believe if there's a Nova Scotia standard in place and they then establish a federal one, that the Nova Scotia standard could in fact maybe supercede.
MR. EPSTEIN: I'm not sure what standards actually means when we're talking about either the grapes or the wine. Could you specify what it means?
MR. CORKUM: The standard is the variety will be controlled and what varieties you can grow. The standard is how many Brix, what the acid and the pH is on those things, and they must meet the standard in order to qualify to be stamped as being a Canadian wine.
MR. EPSTEIN: And are you making any progress in terms of establishing provincial standards? Is this actually being discussed?
MR. CORKUM: What we have tried to encourage the provincial government, and B.C. is doing the same thing, is that it is impossible in our opinion to establish one standard for all of Canada because of the variances from one region to another. As a matter of fact, you've got a major variance in the Island in B.C. as compared to the Okanagan. I mean one is like an oasis and the other is like a desert and in France, as small as they are, they have regions, and here people in the Canadian Vintners Association are trying to establish one standard for all of Canada. So it's not going to work for us. It could work for Ontario, but it's not going to work for B.C., it's not going to work for Nova Scotia, it's not going to work for Quebec.
So we have asked two things, one is that we, the grape growing winery industry, work with the provincial government to establish a standard for the Province of Nova Scotia and that's in progress. We've also asked that the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries and the provincial government write to the minister in charge in Ottawa and express the concerns of having one standard for all of Canada.
MR. EPSTEIN: Has that happened?
MR. CORKUM: It has happened. Win, lose or draw, we don't know. All I'm telling you is the concerns we have and what we think has to happen. How it happens, how we make it happen, that's out of my realm.
MR. EPSTEIN: Thank you. Can I get back on the list, too, for later?
MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes. I wonder if it would be of any use for this committee to write to Ottawa to request it.
MR. CORKUM: I think it's of use for anybody who has any interest in this thing to write to Ottawa. We are very concerned that if they get in what they're trying to get in place and the big wineries can ship a tanker full of wine from one place to another, it's going to cost the same to process it through an approved standards committee as it was to ship a case.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes.
MR. CORKUM: So there's not only the establishment of the standard that's important, it's the administration of the standard that's very important.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Bill Dooks.
MR. WILLIAM DOOKS: As any agricultural product would have pest problems, whether it be animals or bugs, what are your - would I say predators? - what's the problem that you would have with pests? Is the wasp . . .
MR. CORKUM: No, it's not, I think it's more the standard of the acid pH and sugar and the variety of grapes that are being used to make wine. It's more that than - we don't really have a predator problem to my knowledge.
MR. DOOKS: So there's not a certain type of bug or anything that would . . .
MR. CORKUM: Unlike other fruits, we don't spray for bugs.
MR. DOOKS: Well, that's where I was going with that.
MR. CORKUM: Yes, we don't use any of that.
MR. DOOKS: So no spraying, there are no chemicals?
MR. CORKUM: We do for mildew, but not for bugs.
MR. DOOKS: So you do spray?
MR. CORKUM: We spray sulphur for mildew, yes.
MR. DOOKS: Is that detected in the wine, the finished product?
MR. CORKUM: Like anything else, if you sprayed too soon before the harvest, you would probably get a sulfur but it would dissipate in the end, and the sulfur is not a major problem.
MR. DOOKS: What about fertilizer? How do you fertilize?
MR. CORKUM: Right now, probably the most we're using is seaweed.
MR. DOOKS: That's certainly natural fertilizer.
MR. CORKUM: Yes.
MR. DOOKS: So it would be a somewhat natural product. What about climate control? I know you have to have acres and acres of fields to get your yield, but has there been any experiment on climate controls such as hothouse growth, canopies over, heaters, spray, a water-type of spray . . .
MR. CORKUM: Not to my knowledge, other than in P.E.I.
MR. GRAY: We have had certain experiments done on sloping sites, using a very large fan in the springtime, during possible frost conditions. So the fan is blowing downslope, sucking warmer air from up above. It has worked extremely well. One of our members has experimented with covering the canopy in the early Spring with plastic, to sort of create a semi-greenhouse. Grapes are self-fertile, they don't need bees to fertilize their fruit. You don't have to worry about keeping the pollinators, if you do that.
Right now, we are looking into the possibility of using heating cables, tied into the bottom wire that holds the fruiting cordon to find out if it is economically feasible to protect the grapes from one or two degrees of frost, the first thing in the Spring. The main problem with grapes, frostwise, it's not the full frost, it's normally a late May frost, after the buds are out and in the one or two leaf stage. You get towards the end of May and along comes a frost, and you lose your primary buds.
Grapevine is odd in that each bud joint has actually three buds in it. There's the primary, secondary and tertiary. The primary one is one which has the most fruit, the best fruit, and, obviously, because it comes out first will be the one that flowers first and therefore hits the highest sugar level in the Fall of the year. If that one is lost to frost, the secondary comes out, which is somewhat fruitful but you have lost two weeks' growth, so that means that in the Fall of the year, you've lost two weeks of sugars. So the fruit quality is quite a bit lower.
That frost in the Spring is quite critical. I would like to answer another one of your questions about spraying. Right now we're conducting experiments with iodine, derived from seaweed. Walter Wuhrer did an experiment in his vineyard last year with great success. I'm part of an experimental plot this year. We will be writing a paper on it to see if it's organically possible to control the fungus with iodine.
MR. DOOKS: Your fungus would be the disease that you would be concerned about? Is that a mould that comes on the plant?
MR. GRAY: That's right, it's a mould.
MR. DOOKS: That would get back to the predator issue I guess, if that's the right terminology. The mould would be caused - how does that happen, is it damp weather?
MR. GRAY: That's correct, sir. Damp weather will cause the mould. It's like a scab on apples. If there's a certain period of wet, humidity and temperature, then the mould loves growing on grape leaves and vines and the fruit, because the leaves and the vines themselves of the grape plant are very high in sugar. So the fungi enjoy this type of environment.
MR. DOOKS: Would they experience that problem down in the old countries, where they're famous for growing wine?
MR. GRAY: They use all sorts of things, including Bordeaux mixture, which is really
copper sulfate and lime, which is pretty harsh stuff. There are newer chemicals that we have available that are environmentally friendly and not dangerous to the public. All these, of course, because they are fungicides, will get washed off prior to harvest so there is absolutely no danger of any residue within the wine itself.
MR. DOOKS: One would have to be very knowledgeable in resource-based knowledge of growing grapes. It's not something that really you can just go out in the backyard and start growing grapes and producing wine. There would have to be history behind you. You would have to have a lot of knowledge. How do you get your knowledge? Who is the wine expert of Nova Scotia? If you're stuck to have a question answered, do you go to this gentleman here?
MR. CORKUM: The Grape Growers Association produced a book on trellising, planting, all the elements that go into it. But you're right, there is a . . .
MR. GRAY: It's very unfortunate that during the downsizing that occurred in government services a few years back that we lost the services of some very knowledgeable people. But fortunately, these people are now working for AgraPoint. The expertise in growing grapes in Nova Scotia exists within the growers and wineries. We don't have a college that we can go to for answers like they have in just about every other part of the world. This, fortunately, is about to change. Guelph University has an exchange program going with the Agricultural College in Truro that should bear fruit within a few years.
MR. DOOKS: Mr. Chairman, I would like to take this opportunity, or you can come back to me, I would like to make a motion from this committee to the federal government expressing what we've heard here today with national standards of the wine industry, expressing the concerns that these gentlemen have, even right down to the point, I guess, in the packaging. What is it that we can do for you in this committee that would help you out, that would relieve some of the federal pressures surrounding your industry?
MR. CORKUM: There are a number of issues that we have to deal with, the least of which is getting the message to Ottawa that we can't have one standard for all of Canada. Packaging, I'm not sure which is the easiest route to go, whether it's for us to adjust to what's there or try to change legislation, but I'm prepared to take that back to the industry and I'm having a meeting hopefully on June 9th to discuss some of these issues and I would certainly want to raise what you brought up. As I say, I wasn't aware of it. I've been merrily going along.
MR. DOOKS: But are you looking for one standard across Canada in the wine industry or a standard . . .
MR. CORKUM: We are looking for a national standard that is based on regional information and regional capabilities.
MR. CHAIRMAN: So what are you getting at? Would it be useful for this committee to write a letter to Ottawa requesting just that, that we have met with your industry and we firmly believe that this would be very important . . .
MR. CORKUM: What I would like to suggest, Mr. Chairman, is that there are three people in Nova Scotia who have been working on this - or four actually, Mark has been working on it as well - Hans Christian Jost, Ralf Wuhrer, and Linda MacDonald from Department of Agriculture. I would suggest that somebody on this committee, I think Jim and I are not the right people to give you the whole story on the standards. People have been working on this for three to five years.
MR. GRAY: Hans Christian Jost has been working this for 12 years.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes, and I know Hans very well, too.
MR. GRAY: He's really knowledgeable on that. One of the points that Ralf and Hans Christian will make as well is that the national standards wanted to put the control or the testing of the wine under the CAP Act. That's the Canadian Agriculture Products Act. The problem with that particular Canadian Agriculture Products Act is that it's dealing with food, and wine is not a food. Wine is an alcohol-based beverage. Alcohol is a disinfectant, there's nothing that will live in the wine, there are no bugs that will live in it.
[10:00 a.m.]
To put it under the CAP Act is meaningless because it doesn't belong there. By putting it under the CAP Act it involves huge amounts of red tape, which is money, either the government pays for it or the industry pays for it. Obviously in the end, the industry is going to pay for it or the consumer is going to pay for it, and for something that is completely unnecessary. Again it is putting excess red tape into a product that does not belong.
The thought that you can have one standard for a country that is 4,000 miles across and you have 15 standards in a country that is 300 miles across is ludicrous, it can't be done.
MR. DOOKS: We're looking for one standard?
MR. GRAY: Yes, but we don't want - you can't have one standard.
MR. DOOKS: We want one specific to our province.
MR. GRAY: We want one specific to our province.
MR. CHAIRMAN: They're working on that now.
MR. GRAY: Yes. But to have one across Canada, 4,000 miles across, and there is France, 300 miles across that has over 15, it makes no sense.
MR. DOOKS: I jumped a bit quickly there, the point that I'm saying is we have the industry, both the grape growers and the wine producers or makers here with us, they are certainly painting a good picture to this committee today. They are telling us they are involved in an industry that's growing, they think the resource is there. For the Resources Committee, in the years I have spent on it, this is good news. They are telling us that they're not necessarily reaching out for government funding but need maybe government support in taking another step, and that's what excites me here today.
I don't know how you're going to do this, if we have to have another session with the people who are familiar with the process that is causing hardship to the industry. Basically you want the ties to be let go of and go on with your business and produce jobs . . .
MR. CORKUM: Basically if you or the executive director were to sit down with the three bodies - there are four including Mark . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: I think at this juncture maybe what we could do is leave it in your hands. If there's anything that you wish this committee to do on behalf of the industry in this province, please get back to us and we can draft a letter and we can run it around to our committee members for approval and do it very quickly.
MR. CORKUM: We will have that letter in your hands . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: We would certainly be delighted to do that, anything that we can do as a committee to assist this industry.
MR. DOOKS: And I apologize for being long-winded, we have been struggling with that.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Does anyone else wish to speak on this topic before we move on? Mr. MacDonell, you're ahead of Dr. Jim Smith and then I'll come back to Bill Langille.
MR. JOHN MACDONELL: Mr. Chairman, I apologize for being late. Actually I came to the door and it was locked earlier. This is an industry that really interests me. I'm really curious about what you mentioned about planting a dozen different varieties of grapes to see how they grow. Maybe before you leave I will ask you what they should be or where I can find out . . .
MR. CORKUM: Foch, Foch, and Foch. (Laughter) No, I'm serious. Foch is gaining as a Nova Scotia wine product for red wine, it's probably the leading wine that we make and we do it well, we make an excellent product out of it and there is a big demand for Foch. The other one that's happening, which is exclusive to Nova Scotia, is L'Acadie blanc.
MR. MACDONELL: Mr. Hendsbee mentioned going on a grape-grower's tour. Do you do those often?
MR. CORKUM: Every day. (Interruptions) Oh, grape growers, I'm sorry, I'm thinking of winery tours, he's the grape grower. No, we have winery tours every day but the grape growers is an annual event.
MR. GRAY: Send me your e-mail and I'll send you this year's invite.
MR. MACDONELL: I've been the Agriculture Critic for five, maybe six years. I never knew about this and I would like to participate in it sometime. I would like to know how many growers make their living, all of their income, from grapes or wine. Do you have that information?
MR. CORKUM: I would say none. Wait, are you talking growers or wineries?
MR. MACDONELL: I'm talking about growers.
MR. CORKUM: Contract growers. Let's differentiate between wineries that grow grapes for the winery and contract growers who grow grapes under contract for the winery. I don't know of any who make their living . . .
MR. GRAY: Yes, there's one family, I'm thinking of Joanne Grant and John Thompson, they have a mixed vineyard and apple orchard. They are 100 per cent farmers, they do nothing else and they are the only ones I know of.
MR. MACDONELL: I'm curious about the level of Nova Scotia content in the wine. You said it was moving up to 75 per cent?
MR. CORKUM: By the year 2005.
MR. MACDONELL: So presently is it 25 per cent?
MR. CORKUM: No, it's 65 per cent.
MR. MACDONELL: In my area there is Telder Berry Wines, but they retail. Is there a difference in retailing at the farm and retailing at the liquor store on the amount of Nova Scotia content in the wine?
MR. CORKUM: There is but there is also a difference between Telder Berry and us, they are a fruit winery. They primarily make their product from fruit grown in Nova Scotia, so theirs is probably 100 per cent. Ours is a grape winery and the grape winery is going to be required to reach 75 per cent. Part of the rationale for that is that two things could happen - one is we could have a low-production year because of weather and two is we need the ability to adjust wines by adding other products because we are limited in the types of grapes that we can grow. So that 25 per cent allows us to bring in a product to adjust the product we are producing to be more palatable and more marketable.
MR. MACDONELL: I guess my question is in terms of wine, if you were a farm winery with grapes, like Sainte-Famille, and you were retailing your wine at the farm, by 2005, is the amount of Nova Scotia content different if it's retailed on the farm compared to retailed at the liquor store?
MR. CORKUM: Yes. Anything that is retail - and we don't talk retail at the liquor store, we're wholesale to the liquor store, if we can differentiate between wholesale and retail - leads to 75 per cent. Anything we wholesale to the liquor store is no different than Andrés.
MR. GRAY: One point, sir, Doug's talking about a farm winery, which is his size. We also have legislation for a small farm winery, which is a hobby winery, they require 95 per cent local content in all of their wines. These are wineries of less than 10 acres in size.
MR. MACDONELL: I know there are a lot of factors involved in yield, et cetera, but can you tell me what type of acreage a farmer would need, what type of volume he would need to make a living?
MR. CORKUM: Our position is normally a minimum of 40 acres and you have to look at buying a tractor, you have to buy a sprayer, you have to write off all of this equipment. There are people who have attempted to give up 10 acres and buy a tractor and do all these things on 10 acres and then they say you can't make money. You're right, you can't make money.
My wife and I have looked at it very carefully, on the cost-per-acre and I don't care how you work it, it comes out to $10,000 an acre to get grapes producing. Do you agree with that? Okay. And you need 40 acres if you are going to make a living or make what it would cost to live on a farm these days.
MR. MACDONELL: I'll just ask one more question. I'm really interested in what you were saying around the control of fungus, the use of iodine, or seaweed, or seaweed extract, or sulphur right now I think is what you were saying . . .
MR. CORKUM: Sulphur is one of the ones that we use but sulphur can't be used on all varieties, that's the problem.
MR. MACDONELL: I really would be interested, when the report is done - I don't know how accessible that would be to the public or if you intend for the public to see it - I certainly can see if this works, I'm thinking about application to other fruit, if there could be one that might work. Certainly strawberries, I think, is one that has real problems with fungus. Along with that same question you said that grapes don't like to have their feet wet, but I'm curious, I'm thinking they probably need a lot of water, but it has to have the ability to drain. So can they stand dry?
MR. GRAY: Yes, very well. I'll give you an illustration. I was at a chateau in France, Chateau La Garde. Their wine cellar is a limestone cave that was dug by the Romans. The hill above is where they have their vineyard and it's all Cabernet Sauvignon that they're growing there with a mixture of Merlot. The roof of the cave to the floor of the vineyard is 35 metres, over 100 feet, and there are roots coming through the roof of the cave, okay, so grapevines
are very deep-rooted. They will go and they will find water and you don't have to worry about moisture. That is why during the drought years that we had a few years back, the only vines that really suffered were the one-to three-year-old vines. I think it was four-or five-years-olds, I didn't notice a difference, but in fact I had one of my best crops of Michurinetz that particular year. This is the Michurinetz that Hans Jost was selling for $40 a bottle, it came from my vineyard. So, obviously, I had some excellent, excellent grapes that year.
MR. MACDONELL: Thank you. I would like to get on the list again if we have time.
MR. CHAIRMAN: How far back does this winery date with the limestone cave, I wonder.
MR. GRAY: I don't know, about 300 or 400 years. The winery is very old because I can tell from the buildings. The buildings are very, very old. Chateau La Garde is a first-growth, you know, it's in the same class as Pauillac, Latour, Rothschild, but it was just a fabulous place. (Interruption)
MR. CHAIRMAN: When you're taking your next trip over there, you should take this committee with you. Dr. Smith.
DR. JAMES SMITH: Mr. Chairman, I just dropped in pinch-hitting today, I didn't realize this committee had so much fun. Here it's 20 years, I'm retiring, and I'm just finding out how much fun you're having here. It's been quite interesting, and I think we're all interested. Bill talked about people making their own wine and you mentioned, Mr. Corkum, that many of the people who come down and buy the wine are also making their own wine. So there's a great interest in it and, as you can see, some of the mundane work we have to do as legislators, this is really quite exciting. I just have a couple of observations and maybe a more specific question regarding the space rentals for the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation which gives me an opportunity to ask a question on something that has come to my constituency office.
I think first, and you mentioned about what government can do, and so many times you hear from small business, not necessarily handouts that they need but a need to cut through some - not necessarily red tape because it's your own colleagues who are making some of the red tape, in Ontario for instance. I couldn't help but think that over the years I've gone as a minister to various federal and provincial meetings and have seen the alignments of provinces and so many times, and almost always in fact, it was the rest of Canada against Ontario. I found the colleagues that I linked with as the Minister of Health, or Justice, or Municipal Affairs, or Social Services, it often tended to be Quebec, almost always Quebec, Saskatchewan often, depending on what the issues were, and maybe B.C.
I remember the Minister of Health once saying at a meeting with Allan Rock present, when we were looking at the blood fractionation plant here in Bedford, setting that up, and
he said to that meeting why would anyone ever go to Nova Scotia to set up a laboratory like that. So welcome to the club. It's no different, but I couldn't help but think at that meeting that Minister Wilson said that to us, you know, like, well, we know what's best for the country and you just do what we say and everything will be fine.
So anything we can do here, I think Bill Dooks' points are well taken, but before you write to the federal government, you have to be careful what you're writing about because you might get what you write for and if you're not writing for the right thing, you know, it's like be careful what you hope for, you might get it someday. So it is important and you have very strong points to make, that when you look at the industry in France compared to here, but I think it's part of the culture of the country that you're dealing with as well and this goes across everything. So you're not being singled out by Ontario. I mean I think we've all suffered their swords.
MR. CORKUM: That's Andy's, that's why we brought Andy, he is going to tell us how to deal with these people.
DR. SMITH: Yes, well, I think it is important, but it is such a small business where the focus of the governments must be in the provinces and the standards and regulatory matters, but in my experience sometimes in speaking with small business, they want help in this regulatory area or to cut down, to streamline, and to assist there. Also to assist when other companies come in that they can maybe help communications with other groups. I think your relationship with Guelph is important and that resource, to me, to have resource centres that are available is crucial. That can all be done on-line now, but someone must be responsible for it. I think that is something that the province is not able to do, that we could do cojointly, support this group in accessing that type of resource from, say, the University of Guelph which has a great reputation in that area.
[10:15 a.m.]
I just want to say how I've enjoyed today. I suppose next week I will come back you're going to be talking about something mundane again, but my question specifically was some queries I've had with regard to the cost of rent, what you pay per square metre or square foot in the HRM area and outside of HRM and types of contracts or length of time of the contracts and renewals. I'm not quite sure what the person's question that called me was, but there was some concern there was some disparity in ability to access that in the competition for rental spaces for your outlets within the HRM metro as opposed to other parts of the province. I know it's not a very clear question, that's all the information that I had. I don't want to get more specific because I'm not sure of the accuracy of the person's information, but is that an issue? Any clarification I could get back to that person of what your rental system is and how that works?
MR. BARKER: Yes, I'm not quite sure exactly what the specific issue might be, but just for this committee's information, as per government policy, we tender all of our locations. So if we have a location where a lease is expiring and there may be a desire or requirement to move from that establishment, we will set up a normal tendering process and go to the market to see what's available. So every location is done individually but under the same policy.
DR. SMITH: And across the province?
MR. BARKER: Exactly right. Yes.
DR. SMITH: What general range are we looking at now in this year? What are you expecting to be paying? That varies as to where the local area is?
MR. BARKER: Absolutely. A particular location like an airport location, it may actually be very, very high because of the nature of the competitive market to get into that particular location. In other situations we're able to do new developments or something with a partner - for example, Sobeys or Superstore - which can significantly save money. So there is a very significant range as to how much it costs on a square foot basis.
DR. SMITH: The queries we get in our political offices is usually somebody has some space, can't rent it to you, somebody next door he thinks is competitive, gets it and he finds out it's at a fairly significant price that he wished that he was getting. It's that sort of thing. I was just wondering if - I expect you would have answered a tendering process and that, but it seemed to be this person's concern was the disparity of Halifax metro as opposed to outside - outside, other parts, maybe even HRM, outside in more rural communities.
MR. BARKER: Yes, it's hard to throw around these specifics but it does certainly vary by location, but not just by HRM. Arguably, there's certainly rents that we would be paying in Sydney, for example, that would be similar to HRM. Perhaps New Glasgow, for example, some of the larger communities all have similar levels of rent.
DR. SMITH: If I have a specific question, is there someone I could call?
MR. BARKER: Absolutely. Or just call me directly, that would be fine.
DR. SMITH: Great. Thanks very much.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Jim. I have to tell you that your first observation was correct with regard to this committee and the content. I know I keep walking away from this committee saying, gee, this was the best meeting yet and I've done it over and over agin. No doubt today I'll be saying this is the best committee meeting yet.
DR. SMITH: Do you mean it will be the marijuana growers next month?
MR. CHAIRMAN: Hemp growers. Bill Langille.
MR. LANGILLE: I'm just going through the notes here and it says you recently returned from Europe where you competed in competitions winning 12 medals. These 12 medals that were won, could you elaborate what they were and is this a regional basis or is it worldwide or what? The reason I'm asking is because you can go into a store and you see multi bottles of wine which have won medals - are these prestigious medals or are they just medals? The reason I'm going there is because you can look at any organization, look at the boxing commission for one and they have all kinds of belts but there's only a few that mean anything. Look at the military, Americans have lots of medals, they give out lots of medals where the British don't give that many and that's where I'm going with this. How prestigious are these medals that you have won?
MR. CORKUM: We haven't won a lot of medals because we don't submit to them. We sell a lot of wine, so we really don't send it away to get a medal for it. Most of the medals that you get are competing on a national or international basis. They're all very qualified tasters telling you that this wine is better than other wines that they've tasted that day. I'm no expert on it. You will have an opportunity to talk to Hans Christian Jost who submits many products to many competitions and on June 3rd you're going in there.
We would love to be able to announce that we've won a medal. Our problem is that sending wines away is an expense and we don't need that right now to sell our product. We need more product. We need more grapes being grown is what we need. We need double our production of grapes.
Don't think any medal that you see on a bottle of wine is anything other than a medal that was deserved and a medal that was processed through due process of qualified tasters determining what the quality of that wine is.
MR. LANGILLE: You just alluded to something there where I was going to. It's 65 per cent content now which will go to 25 per cent by 2005?
MR. CORKUM: Seventy-five. We started out at 25 per cent and it escalates 5 per cent a year. That's the way the equation took place.
MR. LANGILLE: You just said you have to grow more grapes. How are you going to do this? What's your strategy with regard to growing more grapes to reach this 75 per cent level?
MR. CORKUM: The preferred strategy would be to have contract growers. I think it's fair to say that at the same time a winery has to look at being its own supplier of grapes for security reasons. I could have a contract for three years with Jim here and in three years he could go to some other winery so now I'm short that product to meet my demand for my product. So it's a Catch-22 situation. We really need the security of growing our own grapes, but at the same time we will encourage contract growers to grow. In the end, I think the rotation of people moving from one winery to another would equal out so if we had enough growers and enough grapes being produced, it all takes time and I won't be around to see it. But contract growing is certainly a way that the wineries would prefer to go, at the same time recognizing that they need the security of having a certain level of production of their own.
MR. LANGILLE: My last question is, the wine growing industry and people drinking wine, there are more people consuming wine products than ever before in history. They're drinking it at the expense of other alcoholic beverages, I would assume.
MR. CORKUM: I hope they're just drinking more of everything.
MR. LANGILLE: Well, we're living in good times. I was just going through the stats and since 1999, we're certainly living in good times according to the stats here. But I won't go there now. Anyway, the wine industry is growing, but I just want to go back to the wine kits again. That concerns me. I believe it's a much larger market than anybody realizes out there, or if they do realize it, nobody is coming forth and saying it. I don't believe it would be too hard to track the number of kits that are sold, then multiply that into the number of litres which the kits would make. Therefore, we would have an idea - and I think that's something we can pursue or I could pursue as an individual. I don't know where I would go with it, but I don't think it would be too hard to track that. It shouldn't be because of the retailers. Anyway, it's certainly been informative for me.
MR. CORKUM: Mr. Chairman, I think that in addition to the brew-your-own beer and make-your-own wine from kits, the government is presently looking at a U-Brew policy for Nova Scotia, which is where a store is set up, you go in and buy the kit, rent some space, rent a jug, and they actually do the whole process for you. That's been kicking around now for a couple of years. We, as a wine industry, gave our opinion to government that we didn't think it should be allowed. That is again expanding the non-taxable, non-profit to the industry. I take it senior citizens who have a one-bedroom apartment or something and haven't got the space can now go into a U-Brew and have it all done for them, walk in and give them $35 and walk out with five gallons of wine.
There are things happening in the industry that government should be cognizant of. One of the things is, I walked into a liquor store the other day, I saw a Chardonnay for $7.99, that's discounted by 50 cents a bottle. That's coming from countries outside of Canada or from Ontario. To me, that's dumping. I know what this gentleman pays me when he charges $13.50 for a 1.5 litre of wine, and I can't afford to put the wine in the bottle and ship it to his
plant for what he is prepared to pay to sell it at $13.50. If they're selling Chardonnay at $7.95, then somebody is dumping wine here. Dumping was illegal at one time, I'm not sure whether it still is or not.
But if they're selling it for less than it costs to make it, isn't that dumping? Well, let's see if we can't do something about dumping products in here from all over the world. There is a surplus of wine being generated or produced worldwide now. Every country in the world is getting into making wine.
MR. CHAIRMAN: I wonder if Andrew would like to respond to that before we go any further.
MR. BARKER: I think Doug brings up a very good point. Maybe just to take a second on that, when we do public opinion surveys right across the country, different liquor boards, certainly in Nova Scotia, the number one issue that comes up as a question quite often from consumers is about product selection, typically in wines. One of the things that we've done through our new merchandising division, in the last year particularly, is really focus on bringing in as many different kinds of wine as we possibly can. At any point in time, we will have, probably, 2,000 listings of wine. There is probably another 30,000 or 40,000 in the world. It's a question of constantly rotating wine through, trying different varieties from different countries, different styles. We do that more and more all the time.
The problem is our stores don't get bigger. So when we bring in a wine to test it, if the consumer base likes it, that's great, we order more and we put that on a regular rotation. If the consumers don't like it, we have to get rid of it. We've also developed a very aggressive delisting policy. So if you bring in a wine and it sits on the shelf for say six months, if it doesn't sell a certain quota, we then discount it by 30 per cent and get rid of it. That makes room for the next wine that's coming in behind it. If we didn't do that, we wouldn't be able to increase the selection.
So it's a little bit of a Catch-22 here, but we're trying to balance both those things. Doug is absolutely correct, from time to time, in our stores, you will see two or three bottles of a particular product that are discounted, and our goal, very frankly, is just simply to move them out of the way. There are things sitting in Mark's warehouse we want to bring out to the consumers. It's a bit of a rotation strategy.
MR. CHAIRMAN: It's not because you bought them cheaper because . . .
MR. BARKER: No, we can't really do that, no.
MR. CHAIRMAN: You're taking the loss on it.
MR. BARKER: Just to clarify that, though, quite often the agreement with the winery itself will be if it doesn't sell, that they will actually take the discount and absorb it themselves. That's an important distinction.
[10:30 a.m.]
MR. CORKUM: I guess all I'm saying is I don't disagree with Andy. If you've got something, you've got to get rid of it. So, please, on that sign that says $8.79 for a bottle of Chardonnay, say that it's being delisted so people are not coming in and buying that and knowing that it isn't something that's going to be available in the future because, to me, if they see it and it's not marked delisted, they're saying it cost me $11 for a bottle of Chardonney at Sainte-Famille - what I'm saying is tell them it's not going to be available forever. (Interruptions)
MR. CHAIRMAN: Doug, that's a very good point and I believe Andy is making a note to that effect.
MR. CORKUM: I saw it.
MR. CHAIRMAN: So we will leave that in his good hands. Andy, we will leave that one in your good hands. Okay, where were we now? Bill, you were continuing there, did you have something else to add?
MR. LANGILLE: One other question and it might not be material to Nova Scotia, but during the Iraqi war, especially in the United States, there was a boycott of French wine and in Britain also to a degree. Have we seen any decrease in the consumption of French wine in Nova Scotia in the last two months?
MR. BARKER: The easy answer probably is that French is not a large category for us. If you think about it, the categories that grow, they tend to be somewhat trendy when you look at wine sales. Australia right now is extraordinarily high and I think everybody very quickly around the table would agree that they have sampled or in fact Australian wines are regular purchases. Canadian wines are our dominant category. We sell more Canadian wine than any other kind of wine but, as I say, markets like Australia. Some of the European communities, in Italy, France, Germany, have very unique challenges because of the way they do their business and so a lot of those things are working their way through a system, but French wine is not that large a category and, no, we haven't seen any particular drop in it.
MR. LANGILLE: Or rise in it?
MR. BARKER: Or rise.
MR. CHAIRMAN: David Hendsbee.
MR. HENDSBEE: I have a series of questions and I don't know where to start with them and we're running out of time. First of all, could you define for me perhaps, the Liquor Corporation or the winery, what's the differentiation between a farm winery production before it gets to commercial and is there supposed to be a cap in regard to the amount of production or amount of volume, or the amount of sales, in regard to a farm winery which has such a great success and keeps producing a lot of product that has grapes available? At what point is it no longer considered a farm winery industry versus a commercial winery?
MR. SAUNDERS: Yes, there is a distinction between commercial and farm wineries. Farm and cottage wineries are a category where you have to have at least 10 acres of growing and certified grapes to qualify under that category. The one major benefit of the farm winery is that they're allowed to set up a manufacturer's retail store attached to the plant and they can retail those sales through that farm gate store at very little government markup. As a matter of fact, they get a 95 per cent discount from that government markup. So it provides an avenue, and Doug has mentioned this already, that his preferred choice of sales in Nova Scotia is through his farm gate store, and the moment his wines are listed in Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation stores, they are then subject to full markup. So there is a very clear distinction and the big one is that minimal markup that is afforded to the farm wineries.
A commercial winery on the other hand, and the example there would be Andrés which is located in Truro, they can make wine from whatever they want, a blend, they can import bulk, they can do it from local grapes. We're really impartial on how they make it as long as it meets quality standards, but the moment they sell that wine in Nova Scotia, it is subject to 100 per cent markup. So that is the clear distinction between both.
MR. HENDSBEE: In regard to that, I must commend the Liquor Corporation in regard to its promotion of products in the stores in regard to it finally got out and brought little maps, or the little globes, or the little flags, of where the product is from, South Africa, Australia, France, Chile, they actually show the flags of the world. They show where these products are from, but the problem is you go to your product listings on the Web - total confusion. I wish you would take the opportunity to delineate your product listings by country of origin as well as when you get to the Canadian wines, by province of origin. That way I think it would be a lot more user-friendly.
I just went through your wine product listings off the Internet. You have, for instance, white wines, 426 listings, and only 17 of those listings are Nova Scotia wines; red wines, 644 listings of which only 12, which I recognize by the information provided on the list, are Nova Scotia products; and when you get to the fruit wine category, of the 27 listed, 26 of 27 are Nova Scotia products. I was hoping that perhaps we could have a presentation on the Web site of what Nova Scotia products are available, what are the Canadian products, then you could by origin of nationality. I think it would be a lot easier for some consumers to look on the Web site.
If you ever want to see a mish-mash, just print off your product list, your total product list including spirits and everything else. I wish the Liquor Corporation would also separate that in regard to product lines. You will find rums and vodkas and everything listed all over the map. I think there would be a way - I know you can do it by pre-sorting on the Web site, but if you print off a hard copy, it's not that easy to differentiate and look at. I think you can probably make your Web site a lot more user-friendly in that regard.
My other question is in regard to promotion and products of the wine tours and the grape stomps. I have been to one tour and a couple of grape stomps. I think they are a great opportunity to promote Nova Scotia products and Nova Scotia events. I see the Nova Scotia wine licence plates are out there now, in regard to promoting Nova Scotia product. I also had an opportunity to go down to California, to the Napa Valley. I always felt that we have our own Annapa Valley here, Annapolis. I think our own Annapa Valley has the great potential of the local wineries. (Interruptions)
Anyway, I think that if the other members of the committee ever have an opportunity to go on the grape growers tour, it would be an eye-opening experience for them. I was incredibly surprised at the number of small, little hobby farms, for instance the little nest in the hill just outside of Canning, I think. It's just incredible to see what the little growers are doing. The problem is, I think a lot of general society doesn't know that. I think if they had an idea of putting a brochure out, some kind of brochure showing where these wineries are, people could have a tour and see them in progress, throughout the year, instead of just at harvest time.
My question now is in regard to the privately-operated wine stores that are about to open. The privately-operated wine stores, I am sure there is going to be a listing of the variety of sizes, the limitation sizes. What percentage of their shelves have to be Nova Scotia product?
MR. BARKER: The actual percentage of Nova Scotia product will vary by private wine and specialty store, and since not all the stores are opened yet, I can't answer that question. Each store is different.
MR. HENDSBEE: But will there be an encouragement to try to have Nova Scotia product, or are they just going to go out and order what they want to supply the market with?
MR. BARKER: My understanding is that all stores will have a Nova Scotia section, if I can use that term.
MR. HENDSBEE: In regard to the fruit growers or the wine growers that you were talking about, the Canadian standards, could you specify what VQA stands for?
MR. CORKUM: Vintners Quality Alliance.
MR. HENDSBEE: Is that just a standard of quality in . . .
MR. CORKUM: It's a membership program. They tried to adopt it as a national standard and it was rejected in the end. B.C. has VQA, Ontario has VQA; Nova Scotia, Quebec, New Brunswick and P.E.I. have not adopted the VQA. You need a quality standard, you need a logo or something to signify what is standard. I guess the industry is wrestling with the idea, should we look at VQA, which is quite expensive for small wineries, or should we identify something like the Taste of Nova Scotia logo as being the quality identifier for Nova Scotia products.
As I suggested earlier, Mr. Chairman, we are having an industry meeting, hopefully on June 9th, where we will be dealing with a marketing consultant to look at surveying the market to see where we are in the market, and from that information developing a marketing strategy that will help us promote within the province.
MR. HENDSBEE: Now, you mentioned other wineries in the Maritimes. Could you tell me how extensive the industry is in New Brunswick, P.E.I. or Newfoundland and Labrador? Do they have anything in Happy Valley or do they have anything in . . .
MR. CORKUM: No, P.E.I. has one winery, and that's where I indicated, Mr. Chairman, they're growing grapes in greenhouses, because in P.E.I. they had a lot of tobacco industry growers that had greenhouses that became defunct. This gentleman is now growing vinifera varieties which are the ones Jim alluded to as being the most tender and the most - we're concerned with winter conditions.
Newfoundland, on the other hand, has a great fruit winery that found a niche in kosher wines and is shipping all over the world. A rabbi comes in, I guess, and does his thing, and they have found just a great little market for that. New Brunswick is looking at the industry and starting to grow grapes and is developing a cottage wine standard for New Brunswick. Jim, is that correct? They are working on . . .
MR. GRAY: Yes, that's correct and they have their own association. John Rossignol, who is the vintner in Rossignol Estates Winery in P.E.I., is also a member of our association. So we stay in close touch.
MR. HENDSBEE: I notice he has some fruit wines listed in the products. I was just wondering, I know the Ontario Liquor Corporation is the number one importer of wines in the world. I understand it has that reputation of bringing wines across and stuff, but I also understand the Niagara growers and anywhere else in Ontario are now trying to compete with the international markets and are trying to bring in their standards and are trying to promote Ontario wines. If they try to bring an Ontario standard to be the national standard, you're concerned about that. Is there any way we can try to develop a Maritime or an Atlantic Canada standard?
MR. CORKUM: We are doing that. The draft has been done, and the final draft was taken to the Canadian Vintners Alliance meeting, and decided to withhold it. The people representing - Hans Christian and Ralf Wuhrer and Linda MacDonald, and Mark might have been there - they decided, on the basis of what was happening at that meeting, not to present it until it was an approved product by the province. In other words, don't present an unapproved standard, a draft of a standard, wait until you get it finally approved before you let anybody know what you're doing.
MR. HENDSBEE: In regard to the debate over Sunday shopping and everything else like that . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: This will be your final question.
MR. HENDSBEE: In regard to Sunday shopping, there have been concerns expressed by some of the independent corner store grocers that they won't be able to compete with the bigger stores. There has been a request in the past that perhaps corner stores be allowed to sell beer and wine. What would your opinion of that be? Would it be advantageous for us to have just our local products, our local beers and local wines only, available in corner stores, in regard to distribution, also to have it at the liquor stores plus at your own outlets?
MR. CORKUM: This goes back to pre-Andy discussions of my efforts to get a broader access to market. Every time I do something, it was determined that you couldn't just sell local wines in the corner grocery, because the GATT and free trade says you can't do that. To give you an example, at the end of my discussions with Andy's predecessor, I was so frustrated that he ended up saying, well, Doug, if you only had one thing, what would you do? I said, put me in the Farmer's Market, at least give me partial access to the metropolitan market. When it came back, the Liquor Corporation, who are not the free trade experts, went down to Economic Development, and it came back and said, you can't do that, it flies in the face of free trade. I said, that's not true, I want to know who said it, give it to me in writing, because I'm going to pursue this even further.
My position was simple - and Mark will argue with me on this, we've argued before - the government was saying that the Farmer's Market can sell wine, but the Farmer's Market, which is private enterprise, is saying, who qualifies to get into market, you have to be a producer of local products. They determined that if you applied from California to get into their market, you can't get in. So I don't think the government's putting themselves in jeopardy saying that the Farmer's Market can sell wine. The Farmer's Market, which is private enterprise, is saying who can sell wine.
So every time you talk about corner stores, I don't know how you would organize it - believe me, I would love to see it happen - they say the corner stores can sell wine. How do the corner stores restrict it to Nova Scotia wines? I don't know. Mark, you're the (Interruptions)
MR. HENDSBEE: Then would the roadside farm market qualify because it's a local product?
MR. CORKUM: My argument is that they could probably do that because the roadside farm markets could form an association, that would be the body that determines who gets in, not the government. Mark will argue on that and I'm sure he has good arguments.
[10:45 a.m.]
MR. GRAY: Mr. Chairman, I have a question regarding this. How do they do it in Quebec? They're part of Canada, supposedly, but corner stores in Quebec and grocery stores, even large size ones, sell local beer - not imported - and local wine - not imported. Wine in jugs, that is the normal jug wine that's purchased in volume from Peru or Uruguay and bottled in Quebec. Essentially a local product. Now, if they can get away with flouting the GATT - are they flouting the GATT or is there some loophole in the regulation? Or are we unnecessarily being too rigid in our interpretation of the law?
MR. HENDSBEE: It must be the language laws, we will have to put ours in Gaelic then. If I could, I see the corporation folks itching in their seats and I think they have an answer for us.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Oh, Greg. We'll give you an opportunity. I'm just noting you have the biggest title and you haven't been on your feet yet.
MR. GREG BEAULIEU: I'm no trade expert, but like Mark, I sit on the farm wine committee and work with the provincial trade rep on trade issues. I understand that the Quebec situation was a pre-existing situation in Quebec that was grandfathered in when the free trade agreement was signed. So that I think explains that situation.
The only thing I'd add to the question on corner store sales would be when the review of the NSLC was done in the year 2000, that was one of the options that the consulting firm at the time looked into. They looked into it from a number of standpoints, but one of which was, what would the return to the Province of Nova Scotia be if you went this route of allowing those sales? Their conclusion was that the net return to the province would be less. I think their rationale, in part, was that the market is only so big, that what you would have would be a high percentage of transfer sales from NSLC stores into corner stores. With another layer in the retailing world, the corner store has to make a margin on it. You would either end up with higher retail prices or lower wholesale prices from the NSLC to the corner stores so the return would be reduced. I just offer that as what their rationale was. We can only take it at face value.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The reason I mentioned that Greg had the biggest title is because it's Acting Corporate Secretary to the Board of Directors Senior Policy Advisor, Tourism and
Culture. So you talk about your five-litre boxes, he has a business card that's this big. Thank you very much. Howard.
MR. EPSTEIN: The industry vision document and the list of challenges, one of them says, "NSLC pricing policies and listing regulations are overly burdensome to a small wine industry." What does that mean?
MR. CORKUM: I think that's been simplified since that document. There was a time when there was a really complicated equation as to how you get from what you pay me to what you collect at the door. I know even my wife, who is an expert on this type of thing, had difficulty in taking their method of establishing a markup. If I get $5, what's it going to cost at the store? I think that's been simplified some. It was a really complicated process and I think that's been achieved.
MR. EPSTEIN: Was this item on the list in the list of challenges, simply because it was hard to understand or because you felt that the final price to the consumer was too high and therefore was discouraging sales?
MR. CORKUM: Well, both. We thought it was hard to understand - in other words, we couldn't sit down and say if we sold it for $5, we had to go to the Liquor Corporation to find out if we sold for $5, is it going to cost this? Now I think my wife and others are able to sit down and say, okay, but . . .
MR. EPSTEIN: Okay, so now you can understand it. Is the resultant price still too high?
MR. CORKUM: It's too high for us to produce. To sell wine at their markup for Nova Scotian products containing 65 per cent Nova Scotia content and compete in the marketplace. There's a limit to how much people will pay for a bottle of Nova Scotia wine. Let's say for argument's sake it's $14.50. To get wine on the market in their store at $14.50 selling price, my price is down to about $5.
MR. EPSTEIN: So you start with the fact that you have a high cost of production per acre and therefore if the final price to the customer is too high, your sales will go down. That's a disincentive and the Liquor Corporation now says, sorry, we can't really treat you, in terms of markup or taxation, any differently than any other supplier because of our international trade agreements. Is that what we're looking at?
MR. CORKUM: Yes and there's another factor that I'd like to make this committee absolutely, positively aware of. In the Province of Nova Scotia, there are no stretch limits by regulation for commercial wineries. Stretching is where you take a ton of grapes and make either 100 gallons of wine or 1,000 gallons of wine. In most provinces where there is a grape growing industry, there are stretch limits. The government says, thou shalt not make more than x number of gallons of wine per ton of grapes grown in the province. That does not exist in Nova Scotia. Andrés can make 1,000 gallons of wine out of a ton of grapes. We make, by legislation, a maximum of 900 litres of wine per ton of grapes.
I joked earlier about my wife not letting us put water in the bottle, but that's the way you get the cheaper price that you can put on the market and sell it for $5 and make money and still keep within the range that people are prepared to pay at the retail level. We don't have a stretch limit. I want to make sure that you clearly understand this. When a farm winery produces a wine to sell to Andy, it doesn't have to meet the 75 per cent content standard - it can be the same standard as Andrés do because it's going through the Liquor Corporation.
MR. GRAY: I'd like the chairman to be well aware of the fact that Canada is the only grape growing country in the world that would permit a product that Andrés - not to mention a commercial name - makes to be called wine. No other country in the world would permit that what they do make to be labelled wine because of the huge stretch limits in some cases. Their product actually was the first product in Nova Scotia to contain 75 per cent local product - 75 per cent water. The rest is chemicals, flavonoids that they've added and added acid and sugar fermented all together, filtered, dump it into a bag and call it wine. The only place in the world you can do it is right here.
MR. EPSTEIN: Is that the kind of practice that would be controlled under either provincial or national standards?
MR. GRAY: If we ended up with the stretch limits, yes.
MR. EPSTEIN: Well, I mean, are stretch limits being discussed as part of that process? That's what I mean.
MR. GRAY: Yes.
MR. EPSTEIN: Okay.
MR. GRAY: Be well aware of the fact that right here is the only place in the world that you can take a product, use chemicals to give it a taste, sugar to create alcohol, ferment it, filter it, put it in a bag and call it wine and market it.
MR. EPSTEIN: When you say this is the only place in the world, are you meaning Canada or Nova Scotia?
MR. GRAY: Nova Scotia. I'm not sure you can do it in Ontario, but I know definitely you can do it here. I'm not sure if you can do it in Ontario or B.C.
MR. EPSTEIN: I'm sorry, is there an answer to this as to whether stretch limits are controlled in other provinces?
MR. BARKER: My understanding is they are in some and not others. I can't be sure about Ontario because they have the same manufacturer as they do in Truro for Andrés.
MR. EPSTEIN: So it may well be the same process.
MR. CORKUM: My understanding is that Ontario has a stretch limit. I don't want you to get the impression I'm trying to fight against Andrés wines - I'm not fighting against any winery. I'm trying to say that the level playing field does not exist and it only does not exist for me to sell wholesale. I have the advantage of selling retail that Andrés don't have. There are trade-offs and I'm not trying to be unfair, I merely want the committee to fully understand all the elements that go into the process of determining who can do what and how you do it.
MR. EPSTEIN: Okay, thank you.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Very briefly, Jim, please.
MR. GRAY: You have importing juice or wine from a place like Uruguay or Peru in which you have a peon who's earning the equivalent of $150 a month in a very favourable climate which is producing three to four times the tonnage per acre of grapes, obviously their input cost to production is considerably lower, even considering the transportation from there to here.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay, thank you. Now I'm going to give a short snapper to Jim. The last word to Fluff and we're going to have to call it off. We do have a little business that we have to deal with at the end of the meeting.
DR. SMITH: I wasn't going to speak again but the relationship with Andrés and the Liquor Corporation has come up a couple of times today and I don't quite understand it. What you just said sort of concerns me because I can see some of the things you've said.
Certainly if the person came to Nova Scotia from some other place and they ran into some of this stuff, they may well get a negative impression of all Nova Scotian wines. So what special advantages does Andrés have? Maybe this was discussed earlier and I missed it, but I don't understand the relationship. I understand they cannot sell retail. I mean you just made that statement I think. Can somebody summarize in a second or two what that relationship is? Was this something that started early in the infancy of the grape growing and winery industry in Nova Scotia and they were afforded special benefits that have not been extended to other groups or what is it? This has come up a few times here today and I'm wondering . . .
MR. CORKUM: Mr. Chairman, it's my understanding that Andrés came here and opened this plant because they were allowed to do things in Nova Scotia they weren't allowed to do anywhere else in Canada. That's my understanding and I'm sure somebody can research that and find out the whole story, but that's what I understand. Now, what we're saying is, as it stands today, there doesn't have to be one grape in a bottle of wine in the Province of Nova Scotia. You can make it from water, sugar, acid, flavour, you name it. There are no restrictions in Nova Scotia. There are for farm wineries which are in place by virtue of the Farm Winery Policy. We have to do two things. We can only make 900 litres of wine out of a ton of grapes and we have to have 75 per cent of that content in that bottle by 2005 as being pressed and grown in Nova Scotia. Does that answer it?
DR. SMITH: I think so, yes, I think we're there, but there may be some other things as well.
MR. CHAIRMAN: But that's something that you're going to be dealing with in the standards that are ongoing?
MR. CORKUM: I'm not dealing with the standards, Mr. Chairman, and I don't know that they are being dealt with in the standards. You've got to appreciate that standards relate to different things. Standards can say, you can make a wine anywhere in Canada that doesn't meet the standards, but you're limited to selling it, in my understanding, where you live. You can't transship it across borders if you don't meet the standards and if I ask specifically that you spend some time, somebody spend some time with the people who have been spending years on this thing - and I'm not the one. I have little or no interest because our winery is not even trying to ship to New Brunswick or P.E.I., but it is of interest to me in the sense that my winery becomes more valuable if the standards are there and they work to the benefit of all. So I have that much interest, but not the interest that others have, but there are people who have spent a lot of time.
DR. SMITH: Would they sell wine that didn't come from a grape?
MR. CHAIRMAN: Well, apparently they are.
MR. CORKUM: I'm not saying they are, I'm saying they can.
MR. CHAIRMAN: They can, okay.
MR. CORKUM: My understanding is they bring in six tanker trucks of juice a year.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Mrs. Baillie, the last word.
MRS. BAILLIE: This has been very interesting. You seem to know a lot about your work. Anyway, this will be a personal question to Doug, I want to know where can I buy my Foch and L'Acadie Blanc vines?
MR. CORKUM: You can buy them from us, we propagate, or you could buy them down your way - what's the name of that . . .
MRS. BAILLIE: Jost.
MR. CORKUM: No, Jost's father-in-law has a nursery in Tatamagouche.
MRS. BAILLIE: I didn't know that.
MR. CHAIRMAN: You could look into that.
MRS. BAILLIE: Yes.
MR. CORKUM: And I think Grand Pré also propagate . . .
MRS. BAILLIE: I'll go Jost's way. And the name of the book again?
MR. GRAY: The Nova Scotia Grape Growers Guide.
MR. CORKUM: If you give Jim your card, he can make sure you get one. (Interruptions) I can't remember his name, but he has nurseries there and he does propagate for Jost and others.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Well, Mark, Greg, Jim, Doug and Andrew, I want to thank you very much for appearing before this committee today. As you well know now, you've created a great deal of interest here. We've had a senior media person, Jean Laroche, riveted to this meeting for one of the first times in a long time and that speaks well of your industry. I'm sure, Jean, you will report it very favourably on behalf of the industry.
Having said that, this is sort of the wind-down of the committee in the formal sense for the season. I want to mention Colleen Denomme from Hansard. She has been a very quiet participant at this meeting for the past year and thank you, Colleen, for being here and, gentlemen, we thank you for being here as well. Doug, you mentioned that if a letter is put forward, anything you want us to do on behalf of the industry, supply us with a letter and your thoughts, through you to us, and we will be glad to look it over and approve it.
[11:00 a.m.]
MR. CORKUM: Mr. Chairman, I will get you a copy of the letter that was signed by the minister, that Linda MacDonald arranged for, and also get Linda to give you direction as to what she thinks would be beneficial for you to say.
MR. CHAIRMAN: That would be very much appreciated. I am going to go back to your opening statement, where you indicated that you have a great organization and you are also on the brink of a great future here in Nova Scotia. I think we all agree that is, indeed, the case. Again, without further ado, thank you very much. I will ask the committee members to stay just for a moment, so we can talk about another topic. We can do that, just as you're rising because we can do it very quickly, it's regarding the tour. (Interruptions)
Perhaps we could say goodbye to these gentlemen and then come back.
[11:01 a.m. The committee recessed.]
[11:02 a.m. The committee reconvened.]
MR. CHAIRMAN: First of all, here we are, it looks like it's going to be a busy summer for all of us. Would anyone be interested in doing it on June 17th, or would you rather wait and do it after the election? (Interruptions) I see some heads shaking.
MR. HENDSBEE: I thought June 3rd was the date we had on the schedule.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Well, we're asking the question, and it seems that, first of all, the majority would rather wait until after the election. (Interruptions) Mrs. Baillie, we would be delighted, and you, Dr. Smith, if you would like to join us on that, we would certainly ensure that you have an invite.
DR. SMITH: That's good, because I may be running out of invites at that time. I may not be as popular.
MR. CHAIRMAN: You seem very interested in it, and maybe (Interruptions)
DR. SMITH: I think it's fascinating, that stuff with Andrés was really fascinating, as to what is going on there.
MS. MORA STEVENS (Legislative Committee Coordinator): Could I just ask . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: That is the direction we're giving you, I guess, by consensus, that we're going to wait until after the election.
DR. SMITH: What date did committee members have for the election, what was that again? I don't seem to have it. (Interruptions) Isn't that funny, I had June 24th at one time.
MR. CHAIRMAN: I guess you have the direction you're looking for, Mora, and thank you very much. Have a great summer.
The meeting is adjourned.
[The committee adjourned at 11:04 a.m.]
