Small business is giving the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) a failing grade.

Only one in five small and medium-sized businesses in the agri-food and agricultural sectors believe the CFIA provides good overall service, while a majority of those surveyed say the regulatory burden they face is on the rise, according to a recent report.

That report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB), which represents 105,000 small and medium-sized businesses across Canada, also revealed there is a perception that the government agency dedicated to food safety and protecting plants and animals is unaware of how its regulations affect the business sector.

"Small-business owners understand that a certain amount of regulation is important for food safety," says Marilyn Braun-Pollon, the CFIB's vice-president of Saskatchewan and agri-business, but she notes that excessive red tape decreases productivity. "Fifty-eight per cent of our agri-businesses agreed that CFIA regulations added significant stress to their life."

Other key findings of the CFIA Report Card - A Small Business Assessment of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency show that the average business interacting with the CFIA commits more than 29 days per year to comply with CFIA regulations; spends more than $19,000 per year to meet the terms of those regulations; and says the CFIA could significantly improve its communication with the small-business community Further, nearly two-thirds of businesses in the food-production industry reported that the burden of CFIA regulations has increased in the past three years.

"Since these businesses have little choice but to deal with the CFIA, it is essential the agency provide high-quality service that meets the needs of small-business owners. The CFIA has considerable room for customer-service improvement for its clients," says Braun-Pollon.

To resolve these concerns, the CFIB has met with two different federal ministers responsible for agriculture - an initial meeting with Chuck Strahl, who was the minister when the report was released, and a meeting with Gerry Ritz, who is now the minister of agriculture and agri-food, at the end of September - and is in discussions with the CFIA about the study.

"We have a very good working relationship with Gerry Ritz. He was the former secretary of state for small business and for tourism, so we're hoping to see some progress now on his watch," says Braun-Pollon. "We're also pleased the CFIA is willing to work with the CFIB to look at ways to ease the regulatory burden - we have a working committee set up."

That committee, which was recently launched, is expected to meet more regularly during the fall with monthly meetings possible as both organizations work on finding common ground.

Alan Monfette, smart regulation manager for the CFIA, says: "This all started quite a long time ago. The CFIB contacted us about this time last year and indicated they wanted to carry out a report like this.

"Basically, what we wanted to know was that if your members have a problem with 'X' (a certain item), we want to know why. We have been working with them on this for awhile, so the report wasn't a surprise. We welcome the report and it helps us on areas that we can work on. We need to know what stakeholders need and what stakeholders want in order to be able to address them."

Monfette says that while there are no timelines set for results from the working group, the CFIA is taking the report seriously. The agency is reviewing all of the comments in the report and annexes, says Monfette. "We're looking at which items can be resolved in the short term (and) what items will need more time."

Braun-Pollon is hopeful short-term solutions could be in place early next year. "They (the CFIA) realize there are customer-service issues and we want to be a catalyst to move this forward. We want to see some deliverables by March 2008. We're confident we can get some concerns resolved in a timely fashion, but we also know it's going to take some long-term work as well."

The CFIB also says it is possible it will do a followup study in a couple of years to see if its members find that there have been any improvements as a result of the initial study.

(Laura Severs can be reached at laura@businessedge.ca)