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Year in Review

Year in review: Take our canola, please

Dec 24, 2019 | 12:00 PM

Agriculture groups continue to wait impatiently for any news regarding the canola trade dispute with China.

In March, China halted imports of Canadian canola seed, claiming they’d found contaminated shipments. Canadian officials and grain-handling firms have disputed those claims, but the dispute remains unresolved.

Englefeld area farmer Lane Stockbrugger said the issue is significant with China typically purchasing around 40 per cent of Canada’s canola seed exports each year, amounting to just over $2.5 billion in 2018.

Stockbrugger, who is also the chair of SaskCanola, said it was expected this would take a long time to settle.

“I don’t see an immediate, foreseeable fix on the horizon at this point,” he said. “We’re continuing to try to have those conversations with the Chinese to reopen that market and make sure any issues they would see would be dealt with. But it’s been a challenge. That was in March and this is December and the market has not opened up yet.”

The federal government responded in June with changes to the Advance Payments Program to help with short-term cash flow for farmers. The Western Canadian Wheat Growers President Gunter Jochum said on the surface it looked good but it didn’t address the problem.

“It really doesn’t deal with trade with China, with India, with Italy and so on. That’s the disappointing part,” Jochum said. “The cash advance has been around for years and expanding it to a million dollars only helps the really large farms. It doesn’t do much for those who farm 2,000 to 3,000 acres.”

Jochum said the updated program may help short-term cash flow for some farmers, but to be eligible for the $1 million advance on canola where $500,000 is interest free, you have to produce approximately 200,000 bushels of canola. In order to qualify for the maximum, you need roughly 5,200 acres at 38 bushels per acre, which is roughly a 16,000 acre farm.

Jochum said the program changes are a temporary solution.

“The government gives you money that you have to pay back so it’s not new money that’s injected. It’s nothing like what supply management got when they lost three per cent of their quota. They were promised up to $4 billion,” Jochum said. “What did we get? We can take more loans that we have to pay back. It’s worse then a band-aid. It’s a tiny band-aid on an amputated arm.”

Stockbrugger said if there’s a silver lining it has brought groups together to talk and work together. The canola working group held its first meeting in April. Representatives discussed the importance of focusing on a science-based solution to resolve this issue. The group also touched on future opportunities to expand into new markets for canola, and reviewed support available to affected producers.

The working group membership includes Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Canola Council of Canada, Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Canadian Canola Growers Association, deputy ministers from the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba as well as other senior government and industry officials.

Stockbrugger said it also forced organizations to look at other markets like renewable fuels.

Not knowing what the future holds for the canola industry has created a lot of angst in the farming community. Stockbrugger said there is uncertainty heading into the next growing season.

“I know everyone was talking about ‘let’s just get through 2019’ and that started in the middle of summer and it continues today. There’s just a lot of unknowns about 2020,” Stockbrugger said. “Financially, we’ve taken a hit. You hear of it having an impact on things like machinery dealerships in terms of sales. You hear those concerns because if farmers are hurting, the rest of the economy is hurting. That’s a real challenge.”

alice.mcfarlane@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @AliceMcF

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