The change would be quick and deliver result without extra costs.Ottawa—Regulatory modernization is the simplest and quickest way to enable the agrifood sector to help drive a national economic recovery, says CropLife Canada.Governments already have a road map to steer the sector “as a driver for investment, jobs and growth at a time when Canada will need it more than ever,” Dennis Prouse, Vice-President for Government Affairs, told the Commons agriculture committee last month.The Barton Report from 2017 and the agri-food economic strategy table report from 2018 “outline the tremendous promise of Canadian agriculture and how we are now falling short of meeting that promise,” Prouse said.“The economic challenge post-COVID-19 is going to be making Canada's critical industries more competitive, and agrifood is at the top of that list,” he said. The road to growth “lies in replacing out-of-date and globally-unaligned regulatory regimes with new enabling regulatory frameworks that leverage global best practices.”The Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and the Business Council of Canada also support this approach, he said.Governments should back it as well because “regulatory modernization is relatively easy to implement in that it often doesn't require legislation or even regulatory change. Often, new policy is all that is needed.”Nor does it require “new funding, an important consideration in the years to come—and it delivers fast results. It should be a top priority for governments across the economy.”“Specific to processing and value-added products, we have a number of examples of innovations in the form of new plant varieties that have either moved to the United States already or are in danger of doing so simply because Canada lacks a clear regulatory framework for plant-breeding innovations broadly,” he said.“A key example of that is products of gene editing. These are value-added products that could be grown and processed in Canada, giving benefits to both Canadian consumers and our export markets. In short, processing plants will get built wherever the innovative technologies hit critical acreage first, which is where they get planted first, and unfortunately, right now that is not in Canada.”Canada is lagging “behind many of its like-minded, science-based global competitors, including Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Brazil, Argentina and the United States, which have found a reasonable path forward for gene editing and are already reaping the benefits,” he said.Hopefully consultations on regulatory reform will start as promised this year to align Canada “with these countries quickly and put us back in the game.” The government should act on its 2019 budget promise to place a competitive lens on regulatory agencies.The agrifood sector is “deeply proud of the role that our technologies have played and will continue to play in making Canadian agriculture more sustainable than ever. This improved sustainability is not a slogan. It's a scientific fact.” Farmers also care strongly for the stewardship of their land, and they are determined to leave a better environmental future for the next generation. Sustainability has been, and remains, a cornerstone of what we do.”Alex Binkley is a freelance journalist and writes for domestic and international publications about agriculture, food and transportation issues. He's also the author of two science fiction novels with more in the works.