The value of Canadian food exports is falling this year while the value of imports is up sharply.
By the end of April, the net Canadian food trade surplus for the first four months of the year was $2.3 billion, down half a billion dollars from last year.
Without a strong recovery, the four-month total suggests that like last year, the value of food exports will fall this year, slipping further away from the official goal of almost doubling exports to $40 billion within six years. By the end of April, food and fish exports were worth $8.26 billion, down 1.5 percent from last year’s $8.4 billion.
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Lower grain and hog prices are part of the explanation.
Statistics Canada, which published the trade figures last week, said canola sales also were a problem.
“Sharp drops in canola exports to China and more competitive pricing by European canola exporters may have contributed to the decrease,” said the federal agency.
Railways open books
The railways last week provided the Canadian Transportation Agency with evidence they hope will convince the CTA they have shared productivity gain profits since 1992 with farmers.
Arthur Kroeger, the federal official hired to lead planning for grain transportation deregulation, has asked the CTA to conduct a quick review this summer of railway costs.
In early June, in a letter to the agency’s chair, Marian Robson, he added a request to also assess the railway claims that they have shared the benefits of productivity gains.
“The railways have indicated they would co-operate with the agency,” he wrote. The railways were told to have their supporting data to the CTA by June 16.
He asked that the confidentiality concerns of the railways be respected.
The CTA is to complete its report on costs and productivity profit sharing by mid-July.
