They are expressing extreme concern about their ability to get potatoes out of the ground and, with frost fast approaching with the onset of the winter months, they fear that they will lose their crops.

When abnormal rainfall destroyed potato crops last year, our government reacted quickly and in partnership with the province to put in place the P.E.I. potato assistance program under the agrirecovery program framework, in order to assist producers and reduce the risk of further crop losses.

I would like to point out that hunger has been a constant feature of European history, for example the famous potato famine in Ireland which led to the depopulation of the island; many other parts of Europe were also depopulated by famine, for example Ukraine.

As far as the use of the production quotas in the EU-15 from 1998 to 2004 is concerned, it is 93% on average due to the influence of the 2003/2004 marketing year, where a drought had severely damaged the potato crop in Europe.

Only last month on a farm next door to mine in Scotland, the young husband and father of a family died after being caught in a potato-harvesting machine.

A partial list of the matters that brought us into frequent and close contact over a period of seven years would include the creation and early activities of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency; the negotiation of economic development agreements between the federal government and Prince Edward Island; the Meech Lake Accord; Canada-U.S. free trade; the PVY-N virus which struck the P.E.I. potato crop; import restrictions imposed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture on P.E.I. potatoes; the need for investment incentives to offset closure of the Summerside air base; the location of the GST processing ...[+++]centre in Summerside; and, of course, the fixed link.