Soutien aux exportations bioalimentaires

Soutien aux exportations bioalimentaires (SEB) is a financial assistance program offered through the Export Fund aimed at accelerating projects to develop markets outside of the province by Québec agri-food businesses. The assistance is for enterprises that wish to:

Better prepare and strengthen their export capacity;
Diversify their markets outside of Québec.

Eligible Clientele

For-profit and social economy agri-food enterprises that are legally incorporated in Québec, and which have an establishment in the province, that market agri-food products or food produced or processed in Québec.

Activities and eligible expenses

To be eligible, a project must be aimed at the development of a new market or the diversification within a market, and which will incur eligible expenditures of at least $10,000 and include one or more of the activities showed in the table attached, carried out over a maximum period of 12 months.

Financial Assistance

Financial assistance will take the form of a non-reimbursable contribution for up to 50% of eligible expenses.

Export projects that reflect ministry priorities are eligible for enhanced assistance of 10%, which can increase the level of assistance up to 60% of eligible expenditures. Projects that involve the marketing of organic foods, foods of good nutritional quality or improved nutritional value or ones that promote health, or foods for which the development, production or marketing are part of a sustainable development approach, could also benefit from this bonus allocation.

Eligible percentage	Bonus for projects corresponding to ministerial or government priorities	Maximum financial assistance per year and per applicant *
50%	+ 10%	$100,000

*The maximum financial assistance granted to an applicant covers all related enterprises.

The total amount of government assistance cannot exceed 75% of the total eligible expenses for the project.

Maximum financial assistance thresholds exist for the following activities:

Activity	Maximum financial assistance
Hiring of specialist for markets development outside of Québec	Hiring of one person until the expiry of the Soutien aux exportations bioalimentaires program anticipated for March 31, 2021 $30,000 over a continuous period of 52 weeks
Access to an online sales platform	First year of access only $10,000 per platform
Registration of a trade mark	$10,000 per year
Provision of merchandizing expertise	$25,000 per year
Purchase of market data	$25,000 per year
Hosting costs for foreign buyers or partners	$150 per day present in Québec

Assistance for travel and living expenses outside of Québec for employees of the enterprise will take the form of a lump sum, up to a maximum of 16 trips per person (flat rate) per year. A travel is a return trip from Québec, regardless of stopovers, provided the length of stay is at least 24 hours:

Location of travel	Amount of financial assistance
Canada and the United States	$850
Mexico, Central America and Caribbean	$1,250
Europe	$1,550
Asia, Oceania, South America, Africa and Middle East	2,350
Supplement that could apply to Québec's remote regions	$500

Are eligible from August 3, 2018, the expenses of companies that submit an application before January 31, 2019. From February 1, 2019, the expenses related to export projects of companies participating in Soutien aux exportations bioalimentaires will be eligible from the date of receipt of their application.

Criteria for analysis

The Ministère de l’Agriculture, des Pêcheries et de l’Alimentation (MAPAQ) and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAC) will analyze admissible applications based on the following criteria:

Assessment of the incentive nature of the financial assistance compared to the financial situation of the enterprise (this assessment will take into account the enterprise’s equity situation in relation to the amount of the assistance and any dividends paid in relation to net profits); // Alignment of the project and the enterprise’s business model; // Capacity of the enterprise to complete the project; // Assessment of the risk associated with project activities; // Assessment of the potential impacts of the project.

Conditions

An enterprise that wants to receive financial assistance from the SEB program must satisfy all general conditions as well as the following:

If the enterprise has 50 or more employees, it must hold or be in the process of obtaining a francisation certificate, in order to respect the provisions of the Charter of the French Language (CQLR, chapter C-11, sections 135 to 154).
If it has more than 100 employees and the financial assistance awarded is $100,000 or more, undertake to implement an equality program that complies with the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms (CQLR, chapter C-12) as the enterprise is then subject to the contractual obligation program.
Adhere to ethical behaviours that are not likely to tarnish, even by association, the image of integrity and probity of the government.

To apply for financial assistance

Applications must be sent to Groupe Export agroalimentaire Québec-Canada which will then forward completed applications to MAPAQ and AAC for analysis. Groupe Export will also send to the enterprise, via email, instructions for providing MAPAQ with financial statements.

In French, complete all sections in the registration form. Please send us an E-mail to request the application form »
Compile all the documents related to the activities being requested in the form, such as:

- The organization’s francisation certificate;
- The access to equality program;
- Service offers from consultants;
- Proof of consultants’ expertise;
- Technical specifications;
- Table detailing the costs of purchasing trade marks;
- Table detailing the anticipated costs of access to each online sales platform;
- Description for the position of development specialist for markets outside of Québec and the curriculum
vitæ of the candidate to be hired;
- The enterprise’s organigram before and after the hiring;
- Organic certification;
- List of ingredients and nutrition facts tables for the products;
- Documents relative to the sustainable development approach;
- Last two financial statements covering three financial years.
Send the application form and all required documents by email to: seb@groupexport.ca. If you have a handwritten signature on the application form, please scan the last page of the application form and include it as an attachment to your email along with the electronic version of the form that was completed on the computer screen.
Follow the instructions contained in the correspondence from Groupe Export to provide MAPAQ with the enterprise’s financial data.

Failure to reply to and any refusal to answer a question or to provide a required document may result in the rejection of the application.

Recipients of financial assistance under the Soutien aux exportations bioalimentaires program will be required to complete a sheet on the impact results of the assistance on an annual basis.

Information

For any questions regarding financial assistance for individual export projects, please contact :

Christine Gingras at 1-800-563-9767, ext 218 or by email at christinegingras@groupexport.ca

Maryse Nadeau at 1-800-563-9767, ext 210 or by email at marysenadeau@groupexport.ca