Our commitment to farmers in supply-managed sectorsmeaning, egg, poultry and dairy farmersis as strong as it always was. I repeat, our commitment is clear. Dairy producers received their first payment at the end of last year or the beginning of this year. Support for poultry and egg farmers is in the form of investment programs, which aligns well with the recovery. At this time, we are focusing on emergency programs to help farmers hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. When it comes to the dairy sector, I hope I can count on your support. As you know, legislative changes are needed to grant the Canadian Dairy Commission's request and increase its borrowing limit by $200million so it can buy more butter and cheese.
Our next question will go to Mr. Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we're all inundated, as we've heard during this entire question period, with Canadians' concerns about the economic restrictions and the social restrictions that they're under. Over the last couple of months, the WHO has given one very consistent message in terms of coming out of those economic and social restrictions. On March 16, Dr. Tedros said in his briefing, We have a simple message for all countries: test, test, test. On March 25, 44 days ago, he said, Aggressive measures to find, isolate, test, treat and trace are not only the best and fastest way out of extreme social and economic restrictionstheyre also the best way to prevent them. Does the minister agree with the WHO that relentless testing and tracing are critical to a successful economic and social relaunch strategy in Canada?
Thanks to the member for the very astute observation and question. Absolutely, we agree that testing and contact tracing will form an important part of our response to living with COVID. We've been investing heavily in ensuring that we have the lab capacity, the collaboration across provinces and territories, and the variety of testing options to help us increase our capacity to test. We are aiming right now for a high volume of tests, but I will also say that in Canada we have one of the highest testing rates in the world. Although we're doing well, I can assure him that I am with him and I believe we need to do more.