:
I call the meeting to order.
I want to welcome everyone to our Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. We are doing the APF program. I want to welcome our guests and our viewers, as we are on camera.
With us today we have Mr. Ray Orb, president of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities. Welcome, Mr. Orb. We also have, from Ducks Unlimited Canada, Mr. James Brennan, director of government affairs, and Mr. Paul Thoroughgood, regional agrologist, Prairie Canada. Welcome to both of you.
Also, from Grain Farmers of Ontario, we have Mr. Mark Brock, who is the chairman. Welcome.
You have up to eight minutes for introductory statements, and then we will proceed to questions.
We will start with you, Mr. Orb.
:
Good morning, and thank you for the opportunity to present to you today.
My name is Ray Orb, and I am president of the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, or SARM.
SARM was incorporated in 1905, and we represent all of the 296 rural municipalities in the province. As part of our act of incorporation, we must engage in any activity that furthers the interests of agriculture.
Historically, agriculture has been the backbone of our Saskatchewan economy, and today it continues to be a major contributing force.
Saskatchewan harvested 32 million tonnes of crops in 2015, livestock revenues reached $2.6 billion in 2015, and Saskatchewan exports of agri-food products reached $15.3 billion, so the agriculture sector in our province is strong and will continue growing in order to continue feeding the world.
The agriculture policy framework has been an important program that provides support to the agriculture sector. It is this support that ensures that the agriculture sector is able to continue developing at efficient and sustainable levels.
As Growing Forward 2begins to wind down, we are now starting to look forward to the next agricultural policy framework. SARM would like to see specifically AgriStability returned to its previous version, as was seen in Growing Forward 1. When the coverage decreased from 85% to 70%, AgriStability decreased in its ability to help the middle class.
We are finding that producer uptake at AgriStability has been decreasing, as the program is not as beneficial as it once was. SARM believes that the middle class in Saskatchewan would benefit greatly from restoring the old coverage. This would provide relief to thousands of middle-class families and would make a difference as they work to balance their family budgets.
AgriInvest is another program SARM would like to see amended. At 1% contribution rates, AgriInvest funds are likely to be inadequate to provide meaningful support during periods of severe income declines.
Matched producer contribution rates should be increased to allow for greater funds access, and SARM believes there should be increased federal investments in production insurance through increasing its contributions to the premium and improving coverage options.
Where possible, simplification of the administration of these programs should be implemented in order to ensure that funding flows faster to producers and that less is spent on administration.
Access to non-potable water in rural Saskatchewan is also an issue for producers, as they require water for their operations.
The farm and ranch water infrastructure program provides valuable funding to support the development of water resources in rural areas. Developing water sources is integral to the well-being of a community and essential to the agriculture industry. Enhancing water resources in a community is an important economic driver, and SARM wants to ensure that the funding remains in place for the development of non-potable water resources for rural areas.
Another area that SARM would like given consideration is in regard to climate change mitigation and the environment. As producers adopt the latest technologies and machinery to reduce their carbon footprint, support in the form of rebates or grants would provide an incentive for all producers to continue being environmental stewards and reducing climate change.
Building further on the environment, the importance of the agri-environmental group plans will likely grow in importance.
Providing education and awareness on environmental issues is important as we fight to reduce climate change and as Canada enters into new trade agreements under which new requirements may be expected of producers. It is important that producers have readily available access to this information to ensure that they are in compliance with any requirements that may result from these trade agreements.
SARM has been very vocal in opposition to a federally imposed carbon tax, as it would have negative consequences for the agriculture sector. A carbon tax would not just affect a farmer's use of fuel; it would also affect other inputs, such as farm fertilizers and farm chemicals. Producers are unable to pass these costs on to the consumers, as they are price-takers. This means that as the cost of all inputs rises because of a carbon tax, producers are left absorbing that into their bottom lines.
The agriculture sector cannot afford a carbon tax, which doesn't support the sector's goal of feeding the world as global demand and the populations continue to increase.
These are the areas that SARM would like taken into consideration as the next agricultural policy framework is made.
SARM is willing to examine areas of interest and need. Examples include labour shortages in agriculture and the temporary foreign worker program.
Thank you for the opportunity to present today. I would be pleased to answer questions.
:
Good morning, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for inviting Ducks Unlimited Canada to contribute to this very important study as the government develops the next agricultural policy framework for Canada.
We believe that the next framework should continue to support the growth of an environmentally sustainable agricultural sector while helping Canadians respond to global market demands.
My name is Jim Brennan. I am the director of government affairs at Ducks Unlimited, and I'm also the co-chair of the Green Budget Coalition. Joining me today is Paul Thoroughgood. Paul is Ducks' regional agrologist in prairie Canada, and our primary liaison with the agriculture industry. A farmer himself, Paul has been highly engaged in national discussions on agricultural sustainability, including the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Crops.
As the country's leading conservation organization, Ducks Unlimited Canada has been working for nearly eight decades to conserve, restore, and manage wetlands and associated habitats for North America's waterfowl. Our work and achievements are largely the result of strong partnerships with private landowners. Thanks to the environmental commitment of 18,000 landowner partners, Ducks Unlimited has been able to conserve nearly 6.4 million acres of habitat to date.
Despite our combined efforts, wetland and other habitat loss in North America continues to increase at an alarming rate. Since European settlement began, Canada has lost nearly 70% of wetlands found on its southern working landscapes. We continue to lose more than 29,000 acres of wetlands each and every year. The consequences of this ecological loss are significant and can have long-term ramifications, not only for Canada's finances and climate resiliency but also for our agricultural sector's growth, competitiveness, and public trust.
As a society, we are already paying for many of the lost ecosystem goods and services, or EGS, that are the result of land conversion, including carbon capture and storage, water filtration services, flood attenuation, and groundwater recharge. Producers are also experiencing a number of environmental challenges that affect their bottom line, including more frequent flooding, soil erosion, and population declines of important pollinators and insects. These challenges will only be magnified by a changing climate.
We believe that the next agricultural policy framework presents a great opportunity to help grow a competitive and environmentally sustainable agriculture and agrifood sector, and at the same time take steps to reverse the negative habitat loss trajectory, impacts of which are already being felt by the Canadian economy.
Having environmental sustainability and climate change resiliency as key policy outcomes is an important start, especially because Canada is still playing catch-up in the sustainable sourcing market. Sustainability metrics like “no new land being brought into production” are being developed by domestic and international purchasers of agricultural products. These metrics measure impacts of native land conversion—for example, wetlands and grasslands—into agricultural production in terms of GHG emissions, biodiversity, and water quality.
The concern is that current government policies and programming under Growing Forward 2 do not provide the much-needed market signals or incentives to keep Canadian agriculture ahead of global trends like climate change adaptability or on-farm sustainability, both of which are significantly influencing global market demand, sector growth, and Canada's competitiveness.
As a result, many producers continue to make land use decisions today that have the potential to limit their foreign market access in the future. For example, when we examined three subwatersheds in Saskatchewan using the “no new land brought into production” measure, we found that two-thirds of land parcels would have failed their audit within the past decade.
The issue of newly cultivated land is closely linked to the sector's ability to address the impacts that climate mitigation measures will have on agriculture. While we recognize some of the industry's concerns, we also believe that Canadian agriculture is uniquely positioned to capitalize on some of the opportunities afforded by a low-carbon economy, provided that the right tools, programs, and policies are in place.
Certain agricultural industries have already made significant strides in reducing environmental footprint through such conservation and land management practices as no tillage. Another example is the 4R nutrient initiative led by Canada's fertilizer manufacturers, which helped reduce runoff of nutrient known to cause GHG emissions, algal blooms, and related declines in drinking water quality.
While these initiatives and practices are important, habitat conservation and restoration is still the best mechanism for delivering ecosystem services at watershed scale, which is critical to effective climate adaptation and resiliency.
At this time, I'd like to hand the mike over to my colleague Paul, who will offer you some ideas and suggestions on how the next APF can support the growth of an environmentally sustainable agricultural sector and help advance other important policy priorities.
Good morning.
Considering the environmental challenges and market pressures facing the sector, we believe there is a compelling need for an agri-environmental vision supported by policy leadership and intergovernmental collaboration.
The next APF should be supported by sound legislative frameworks and consistent across other provincial and federal policy objectives, including the one on wetlands. In this spirit, Ducks Unlimited Canada recommends that programs and tools of the next framework fully support the current federal wetland policy.
At a minimum, these programs should not encourage or enable land use decisions that conflict with that policy. Without this alignment, it will be very difficult to achieve tangible landscape-scale results on issues such as habitat loss, water quality, climate change, and biodiversity.
In our experience with Growing Forward 2, the impact of beneficial management practices, or BMPs, is highest in jurisdictions that have strong wetland policies and other environmental legislative frameworks. A good example of this would be Atlantic Canada. Conversely, in areas without these supporting frameworks, habitat and associated EGS losses from unregulated or unlawful habitat destruction dwarfed the perennial cover and wetlands that were restored via BMPs.
In terms of direct programming, we believe that the next APF should build on Growing Forward 2 by developing and enhancing programs that incentivize and reward environmental stewardship and BMPs on agricultural land.
Currently there is a suite of programs that provide producers with cost-shared funding to implement a variety of BMPs that can help farms become more environmentally sustainable while increasing profitability. While cost-sharing may be an appropriate mechanism to encourage on-farm improvements that generate high benefits to the producer relative to cost—an example of this would be improving fertilizer storage on-farm—this type of program has not been as effective at incentivizing BMPs of high environmental value, such as wetland restoration. To increase uptake of such BMPs, we recommend that the next APF facilitate the development and implementation of programs that compensate producers for the habitat and EGS they restore.
Further to this, DU recommends that the principle of additionality be firmly embedded in the new APF and corresponding BMP programming. Under this principle, incentives and compensation would only be provided for activities that deliver environmental gains over and above what's occurring under the status quo, or business as usual.
With respect to the actual BMP program implementation, we encourage government to leverage and maximize delivery partnerships and badly needed resources so that they appeal to farms of all sizes. We believe that simplifying the application process and providing increased support to producers should help increase program uptake.
We also recommend the re-establishment of a landscape-scale perennial cover restoration program like Greencover Canada, which ran from 2003 to 2008. Under that program, producers received financial assistance to establish hay and pasture on marginal land. This land use change generated many benefits, including reduced soil erosion, water quality protection, carbon capture and storage, and enhanced biodiversity.
Another tool that can help expand the environmental awareness and conservation ethic among producers is the environmental farm plan, or EFP. We fully support ongoing discussions on how the EFP can be used to help producers respond to domestic and international sustainability demands. To accomplish this, the EFP has to be strengthened by placing greater focus and support on areas of the farm that are not directly under production.
:
I am Mark Brock. I farm around Hensall, Ontario, and I am chairman of the Grain Farmers of Ontario.
On behalf of our 28,000 grain and oilseed members, I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman and the committee, for the opportunity to provide our perspective on Canada's suite of business risk management programming.
The Government of Canada and the Government of Ontario's support for business risk management programs has always been appreciated by grain and oilseed producers in Ontario, but currently there are inherent problems with the suite of BRM programs. Participation rates in AgriStability have seen a steady decline. There were changes to the program made for GF2 that made it less attractive, but even before these changes, it was not a popular program. It is clear that farmers have lost confidence in the program.
This is a big concern for our organization, as it leaves our farmer members exposed in the event of a market shock. We are very close to a market shock. For example, if the Canadian dollar weren't low, we would have been in a significant price slump.
That said, we are at a time of great opportunity for growth, and at the same time we are also facing increased responsibility to society. According to the FAO, food production must increase by 70% by the year 2050 to feed the growing world population. We all know that arable land is a limited resource and that our air, land, and water are increasingly becoming precious resources. As farmers, we take very seriously our responsibility to sustainably feed a growing population.
Farm operations are very different from what they have been in the past. Today the Canadian farmer is choosing to farm smarter. We find efficiencies in our operations by employing precision agricultural techniques. I rely on GPS maps on my iPad that detail every inch of my farm. I download these maps to the computer on my tractor to control the sprayer to release only the precise droplets of pesticides in the areas that are required. This saves me money and ensures that there is no unnecessary product left on the field. I do the same for my fertilizer applications.
Farmers are managing risks through diversification. My wife Sandi and I co-manage our farm. We have livestock and a grain operation, and we also have our own grain storage. We use marketing and hedging to manage our financial risks, and we rely on the crop insurance program to manage our production risks.
Farmers put a priority on the environment in their practices. My farm buildings are heated with geothermal, for instance. I have employed measures to protect honeybees on my farm, and I plant cover crops to help maintain a healthy soil. These are just examples from my own farm. Every farm across Canada has taken a unique approach to farming smart. Today, the landscape of farms is a spectrum of diverse farming operations across this country.
The current suite of business risk management programs is not addressing the unique diversity of farm businesses we see today, and that's why enrolment is down. A one-size-fits-all approach to BRM isn't working any longer. What may work for my farm won't work for my 30-year-old neighbour down the road, or the pork farmer the line over. Not only are the farms different because of the crops they grow or the livestock they raise, but we have different business models.
If Canadian agriculture is going to be in a position to capture the opportunities that a 70% production increase in the next 30 years gives us, we need to be smart about it. Smart farms need smart business risk management programs to choose from.
Our members are committed to increasing production sustainably, but we can do this only if we have smart BRM programming that helps us to invest in our farm operations and employ innovations.
What do I mean when I say “smart BRM programming”? Farmers need a choice of BRM programs that are tailored to meet the needs of the diverse array of farm operations that exist today. Farmers need to be able to choose a product that works for their farm operation, as farmers are able to do in the United States.
This is what we think the new suite should look like.
AgriInsurance should remain the same. This program works, and grain farmers rely on it not only to protect against unexpected production losses, but also to access credit they need to build their operations. AgriInsurance is an excellent example of a program that works. Enrolment numbers are steady and representative. Farmers pay significant premiums to the AgriInsurance program because they know they can rely on the coverage it provides. Farmer premiums also significantly offset payments from government.
We need more options for coverage fashioned after the crop insurance model. We need a flexible approach that provides risk management options—similar to what the U.S. Farm Bill provides—for farmers to identify their own risk and choose a program that works for their farm operation.
We believe the risk management suite should include the following options, in addition to crop insurance.
We would like to see a program that provides a farmer with revenue risk insurance support based on a five- or 10-year rolling average of price and yield in their region. Different levels of coverage could be purchased by the producer.
We would like to see an AgriInvest style of program with additional coverage over what exists today that will allow farmers the flexibility to manage their own risk on their own terms. For instance, these funds could be used to purchase private insurance products that work for their operations. We believe that for this program to work effectively as a single choice for farmers, additional coverage at two to three times the current rate would be required. We support a design that encourages farmers to utilize their AgriInvest accounts to manage the risk.
AgriStability should remain as a third option, but it needs to be improved. Even though AgriStability doesn't work very well for gain farmers, it can work for certain farms that are diversified in the livestock business. Recent changes to AgriStability have decreased the program's ability to deliver, and should be addressed.
We realize that what we're recommending is not just a tweak to the current suite of programs, but we believe it is important that we get this right if Canada is to be able to take advantage of the growing opportunity for growth to meet the demand of feeding a growing world.
To get them right, we should test the products with farmers in the industry by rolling them out as pilots in a region first. Eastern Canada is a great place to start. In Ontario, our province has long recognized the inadequacies in the federal suite of programming and has provided a risk management product to address some of the gap. A pilot will allow us to develop a program solely to build up momentum and interest by testing it out with farmers in a real-life scenario. This will provide experience to show that increased enrolment and cross-compliance can be achieved through a program that meets farmers' needs.
Once these programs are in place, we think that, just like what the U.S. has provided for its farmers, there needs to be some risk management and financial planning education for farmers. Education is an important part of making these revised programs work for farmers and for the economy, and it should be included in the next policy framework.
In the Calgary Statement, agricultural ministers laid out the path forward and an opportunity for alignment. We believe now is an ideal time for the alignment of timing, interests, and opportunities in the current suite of programs, initiatives, and platforms so they can be better aligned with the challenges and opportunities to support business success and economic growth. We believe that it's important to examine options for the reform of the BRM program to support the vision of creating the most modern, sustainable, and prosperous sector in the world.
Governments have indicated that they have no desire to return to the days of ad hoc programs, but a call for these is highly likely if a major market shock should happen.
There are opportunities to achieve objectives of broader public interest outcomes. Grain Farmers of Ontario are open to cross-compliance mechanisms to help government achieve its broader public interest outcomes regarding water and soil health, climate change, economic development and growth, market development, and innovation, but we need to make sure we have a meaningful suite of programs to choose from that work for today's complex array of diverse farm businesses.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today.
An elevated level of wetland protection policies is in place in Atlantic Canada. Frankly, we think some great leadership is being shown in protecting the base of habitat on the landscape in Atlantic Canada. There is a policy in place that protects existing habitat, and in instances where habitat is destroyed, there is what we call a mitigation sequence in place. In areas where you drain or destroy a wetland, there's an obligation to compensate or replicate the functionality of that habitat. That exists in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and in Nova Scotia. Newfoundland has been looking at similar legislation in recent times. It hasn't been fully effective yet.
In the case of P.E.I., much of this was driven by the need to improve water quality, because there had been issues with groundwater contamination and groundwater quality, and all the drinking water in Prince Edward Island comes from groundwater. I know that Alberta has moved quite far down the road in implementing a similar policy.
With those types of policies in place, there's a level playing field, if you want to call it that, in understanding how the landscape is going to be managed. Those ecosystem services that we've talked about—water quality, reduced runoff, soil quality—that are provided by wetlands and other habitats continue to be provided and supported in the Atlantic provinces, in particular because of the support they receive from those policies.
:
Thank you for the question.
In looking at a pilot project, what we're really thinking about is looking at designing something. For example, an insurance product created in western Canada—the western livestock price insurance program, I believe—is used by western producers for cattle. I think it's an opportunity for pork as well. They took some AgriRisk money that's in the existing GF2 and looked at designing and implementing an insurance product for producers that's really just backstopped by government but not solely focused on government dollars.
What we're looking at is this: is there an opportunity for eastern Canada, with a similar crop profile, to create a program that offers something bankable and predictable for producers in eastern Canada as an insurance-type program, through some AgriRisk dollars, that manages the liability put on government? Those were some of the reasons we saw the cutbacks to AgriStability: there was a huge liability hanging out there with the high rates, and that made government nervous about what was sitting there for exposure.
Is there a way to create some private opportunities, outside of government, that could carry some of that liability, with maybe some assistance from government to create that desired marketplace, to create more opportunities for private insurance options? From our standpoint, is there a way to assist the government, now and through the new APF, to create some of these options in the marketplace, or pilot what it could look like from an eastern Canada perspective? Is it something that could be modelled nationally as well? It's trying to think outside the box a little bit.
To Ducks Unlimited, maybe I misunderstood you, but it sounded as though a major component of your presentation was that you're asking for more government regulation of private land use. There's a difference between best management practices and encouraging those on the farm, and calling on government to come in and regulate the use of private lands. Rural people kind of resist that notion. I'm just wondering if you have some comment on that.
Some of us have been working at trying to get local communities more involved in these environmental projects, trying to bring some the responsibility back to the local communities, giving them some responsibility for choosing the research that's done. To hear a major organization seem to be suggesting that what we need is this top-down approach from outside again on rural communities.... Rural people probably need to know that, if that's what you're suggesting, first of all.
Is that what you're talking about, or are you talking about trying to work with those local communities, giving them more responsibility, and having them create the expectations of improvement, or do you want what I'll call the heavy hand coming from above?
:
Thank you very much for having me here this morning, everybody. It has been interesting to come to Ottawa and meet with you all.
I'll start by just telling you my story about how this all began.
On September 22, I got a phone call from the CFIA telling me that I had shipped a cow to market that made her way to the United States for slaughter and that she had tested positive for tuberculosis.
That was the worst day of my life so far.
The following days were full of conversations with CFIA, and the following week they came out and sat down and quarantined my entire ranch and all my cattle, and we just waited to hear how exactly this was going to go. It was very unclear, and there weren't a whole lot of answers. I had a lot of questions, naturally, and it was tough.
We talked a bit, and the next step was trying to get some testing set up to test these animals, to see in fact if tuberculosis had spread to the rest of our animals. The 22nd was the first contact, and on October 17, just about three weeks later, we actually started the testing on the rest of the animals, and that took a week.
On the ranch, there was lots of stress on animals and people, and we identified 33 reactors out of the rest of the cattle, which was about 450 head in total. Thirty-three out of 450 head were reactors. We waited to hear more on when they were going to go for post-mortems. The only way they can positively confirm TB is with destruction and a post-mortem and testing on tissues.
It was actually November 8 when those 33 reactors left the farm and went to Lacombe, Alberta, to a slaughter facility, where they took samples. It was last week when I actually found out that there were five more out of our herd, so six cattle in total, that tested positive for the preliminary PCR, the genetic test. So far to date, those are the only six animals. They're out of our herd that we ranch together—my family, my father and mother, and my wife and kids. They're all from that herd.
There have been a couple of other neighbours. There's a Hutterite colony and another neighbour of ours who were grouped into the index herd status because of our wintering. We wintered some cattle together, and one of the two herds has been deemed clean so far. There needs to be a culture test. That's the final test that will show exactly if this is for sure. The culture test is the 100% indicator.
I don't know what else.... I have another herd of cattle up north that have been tested, and we're waiting for the reactors to go through the plant and be euthanized and the tissue samples tested.
It has been a long two months. It's two months today actually to the day, and it has been trying. It has been very tough on everyone, as a community. There are 34 ranches in the community, and two just east of us in Saskatchewan have been quarantined, and there are further quarantines going on as we speak. I was contacted by a fellow west of Brooks that I sold cattle to in 2012.
It's very tough. Our whole community is impacted. Almost 90% of the ranches in my area are under quarantine at this point. More than 10,000 head—I think the number is 18,000—are quarantined right now. Very few ranches have been actually tested. The way we're going right now, this is going to take months longer, and once the Alberta winter sets in, it's going to get more complicated.
:
Hello. My name is Ross White. I'm from the Jenner area.
My brother and I ranch in the Jenner area. We were quarantined on October 22, just prior to marketing our calves. We pre-sold our calves in early October and were scheduled to deliver in the last week in October and the first week in November. The quarantine prevented us from marketing our calves, resulting in a loss of profit over the market. We were forced to renege on our contracts. This also put the buyer in a tough spot and may impact future sales to him.
There are many costs that we are forced to incur because of the constraints placed on us by the CFIA and the federal government. We were unable to get a response from the head vet for 10 days from the time we were quarantined. We were told to call him on any livestock movement. How does that work?
Our calves are still on the cow as we have not been given any direction as to when we may be tested and/or when some or all of our cattle will be released from quarantine. We are getting very mixed messages, and the costs continue to rise. The quarantine has affected our management of our cow herd, as follows.
Calves are still on the cow, resulting in the loss of body condition of the cow. There is increased grazing pressure on our deeded and leased land, resulting in loss of litter and carryover. There are concerns over the lack of availability of water for the calf crop that is quarantined, and possibly a huge loss due to wintering-out of dams when the ice is thin. There is the cost of the introduction of the calves when we wean them this week, and the additional manpower that is required when we wean our large herd. We normally don't have that expense, so we are unsure about how to handle this. Death losses may be large if the weather turns against us.
As well, there is the cost of running our cows through twice, and the impact on our facilities and manpower that is required by the restrictions on us to carry out parasitic control and pregnancy testing. We really are unable to treat anything as treatment has an impact on possible slaughter.
There is the cost of embryonic loss of our cattle herd as they are run through the facilities twice. We have the cost of equipment, yardage costs, feed and trucking costs, and costs of additional feed resources in terms of how we don't know what time period we are looking at.
Also, there is the impact of overcrowding our herds, as we are not able to practise normal marketing management practices. Movement is limited by the quarantine. As well, there is the cost of the loss of genetics, as we are not able to purchase breeding bulls this fall with the uncertainty over where to house the new purchases.
This quarantine has placed an enormous amount of financial and emotional stress on our families and our neighbours who are under the quarantine. We truly do not know what the financial cost will be to our individual ranches and what impact this quarantine will have. I recently purchased another ranch to the north, and I am concerned with regard to the reduction in land values caused by the quarantine and the future impact of trying to market cows from this area. We may be quarantined by the buyers long after the CFIA quarantine is lifted. What cost does this carry for my ranch?
This is truly a disaster. The way in which the quarantine was handled has made the process even more devastating. Communication and concern for us as ranchers running a business is totally lacking. The officials in charge have no understanding of our ranch business and the impacts of their actions as they relate to the destruction of our ranches. Many of us may not be able to weather the storm and will be forced to sell out. I appeal to you as the government in charge to initiate some action in the CFIA and the government and take ownership of the calves and all costs. We did not plan for our hands to be tied. I remind you that this is a CFIA action.
Thank you.
:
Good morning. I'm Warren Henry, a third-generation cattle rancher from Patricia, Alberta.
The family's entire cow herd has been quarantined, along with neighbours', cousins', and friends'. We were all carrying on business as usual early this fall. In September we sold our steer calves, half the annual calf crop, by contract through an Internet sale. The buyer expected those steers to be delivered the first week in November. Then we normally make our annual payments, but not this year so far.
However, all changed when we got a call from the CFIA on October 14 telling us the whole herd was quarantined. No animals would be leaving or going anywhere pending the investigation. That's not to mention the people who phoned and couldn't speak English, so it was really difficult to understand. It took two people before we could actually get the gist.
Usually all the calves are weaned on the same day. The first week of November, the steers get on a truck and are weighed on a scale at home, and then they're delivered to the feedlot. The heifer calves are hauled to their home place, and are backgrounded until spring, when we pick out the replacement heifers and sell the balance of the heifer calves.
After weaning, the cows are trailered to their winter fields, where they utilize pasture and grazing corn that we grow over the summer. This year they had to be hauled, also causing more stress on them, especially as all had to go through the chute two times for this testing process. We'll see this spring if our aborted calf numbers are higher than usual due to this extra stress.
We are prepared each fall to put up feed for the heifer calves to use up over the winter, but not for the steer calves that we have on hand right now.
We got a call from the CFIA that they would be coming out to test the herd on November 15, so the calves were weaned on the 14th to be ready for the team to test. This is two weeks later. The pasture where the cows were to go until testing was grazed out, so we had to start feeding the cows and calves the feed that was meant for the heifer calves later on, at a cost of about $600 a day.
The steers were supposed to get on the truck on November 1, and we were supposed to get our calf cheque.
We had to change our pasture plan around to accommodate twice as many calves as usual, but we need to buy the feed for them. We don't have calf cheques to buy feed with because we can't sell the steers. No one can tell us how long we'll have to keep them, how much feed we need, or what we need to buy. Those heifer calves were brought home, and they'll be fed and cared for as usual, but we've already started using the feed that was intended for them.
Also, when you bring all these animals into an area that is meant for half those numbers, you're crowding them, which causes stress, and they're more likely to get sick. We've adjusted our corral space and changed our watering system and pastures around to accommodate the steers in one bunch and heifers in the other. This all requires time and money.
The weather so far has been in our favour, but we still don't know how long we have to keep our calves. If winter hits, it's going to be a lot worse, and they will require a lot more feed.
I understand that I had to come here today to discuss compensation with you, and I thought I'd try to explain how this works for my family. In comparison with how you folks live day to day, it would be like getting a call one day from some agency telling you that all your assets had been seized, and not just your monthly paycheque is being held, but your entire year's income. You carry on, showing up for weeks, and you can't get paid for it the next three, four, or maybe five months, with investigation pending. You can't buy groceries, pay bills, or make montage payments until they decide to unfreeze everything, but they can't tell you when it will be. It's your baby to worry about.
Needless to say, it's an ongoing worry and stress for the whole family, and the unanswered questions and time frames just add to the stress.
Thank you very much.
:
They get on grain as soon as possible. You guys are ranchers.
As far as compensation goes, do you think it would be some type of strategy? Mr. Henry, or perhaps it was Mr. White, said perhaps the government should own the cows during this situation, or maybe they could just cut the cheque early and they'd keep looking after them.
I know farmers who have gone broke while their animals were in quarantine. They're keeping that animal alive, knowing that at the end it's going to be slaughtered, but they're taking their entire savings and every nickel they have to keep them alive, because they're good stewards and they care about their cattle.
Again, on this compensation thing, certainly the government needs to move on that soon. I don't know if either Brad or the other two have any comments on that, but I think that's one thing, given the size of this problem, that we hope we can move the government to do.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate the opportunity to ask questions.
I'll just comment on the online meeting we had with the CFIA. It was an informational meeting and they said that there were 500 head being tested today. With Mr. Henry, I was able to confirm that nobody has seen anywhere near that number, nor the capacity to do it. We did talk with them about some of the information that we were given, which was totally erroneous in terms of what was happening on the ground. It was totally false.
We have 36 businesses going broke in our community. If 36 businesses were to go broke in your community, there would be an uproar. That's what's happening here.
When they talk about the subsidy programs that are out there, this is a one-off. This is different from any of the programs that exist out there. The province is slow coming to the table because they have to work with the feds. When you talk about those programs, how frustrated are you with those ones that exist?
When people say, “Ah, you've got—”