QUESTION PERIOD — Agriculture and Agri-Food
Livestock Price Insurance
December 3, 2020
Honourable senators, my question is for the government leader in the Senate.
Senator Gold, cattle and hog producers in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and my province of Manitoba have a risk-management tool available to them known as the Western Livestock Price Insurance Program. It provides them protection against an unexpected drop in prices over a defined period of time. This is particularly important for our young producers as it increases their ability to secure financing as well as their ability to survive downturns in the market. It’s not a permanent program, however. They need to keep going back to renew it with all of the uncertainties that entails.
Leader, has your government considered working with the Western provinces to make the Western Livestock Price Insurance Program a permanent risk-management tool, not dependent on renewal under each agricultural policy framework, and if not, why not?
Senator, thank you for your question and for informing me and the house of this particular program, the details of which I confess to being unaware. But I certainly will inquire and inform myself as to the program and attempt to answer your question as quickly as I can.
Thank you, Senator Gold. As quickly as you can, I hope will be quicker than how some of the government bills are moving that we are waiting for.
Senator Gold, while Western provinces have access to this insurance program, farmers in the Maritimes still operate without a program that manages price risk in a timely fashion. The Maritime Beef Council, which covers New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, has a strategy to expand cattle inventories and beef production. Having access to a price insurance program is key to achieving these objectives.
Industry has taken the lead by investing producer dollars to develop a pricing index specific to the Eastern Canadian cattle market, and by establishing a working group with Maritime officials and their counterparts in Western Canada.
Leader, will your government fully support and commit to helping Maritime farmers create a price insurance program in their region?
Thank you again for your question, senator. The government is very aware of how important, generally speaking, business risk-management programs are for the sectors across the country, and in particular, the price insurance programs, as you quite correctly point out.
The government has not only been working with sectors across the country, it has heard from different sectors that there are challenges and improvements that need to be made to the various business risk programs upon which the agricultural community sector depends.
I have been advised that the government is in constant dialogue with industry stakeholders to mitigate the risk, to hear their concerns and work to see how, in a practical way, the programs can be improved. They are continuing to work on and consider how tools like AgriStability and others can help producers manage the difficult circumstances that are facing Canadian farmers.
