A group of Manitoba rural municipalities around Riding Mountain
National Park opposes the idea of zoning only that area in a bid to
limit the impact of looming trade restrictions prompted by bovine
tuberculosis.
Currently, the entire province has been zoned by the Canadian Food
Inspection Agency. Beginning Aug. 17, breeding cattle will have to be
tested for TB before they can be exported from Manitoba to the United
States.
Confining the zone to only the area around the park, which could happen
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federal government proposed several months ago to increase the compensation rate from 80 to 90 per cent and double the maximum payment from $3 million to $6 million
as early as this fall, would require less testing of breeding cattle
leaving the province for the U.S.
But the Riding Mountain Liaison Committee, which represents most rural
municipalities around the park, questions whether the smaller zone
would be workable. One of its members said it would place a stigma on
cattle herds there.
“We don’t think that it’s fair to the producers in that area,” said
Dwain Lawless, a cattle producer and reeve for the RM of Rossburn.
“We’re suggesting that it should be a larger zone or it should be done
in a different way.”
It’s unknown how much of an area around the park would fall within the
smaller zone.
Lawless said zoning could lower prices for cattle in the area and lower
land values. Producers need assurances that there will be compensation,
he said.
“A lot of producers are worried about their livelihoods and rightly so.
That’s where that whole compensation aspect of it comes in.”
The CFIA has said October is probably the earliest that a smaller zone
could be implemented.
Ray Armbruster, a Rossburn, Man., cattle producer whose herd was
destroyed in the 1990s because of bovine TB, is among those concerned
about the potential effect on land and livestock values in his area.
He also wants assurances that the cost of testing cattle will not fall
only on producers and that there will be enough veterinarians available
to do the testing so he can ship cattle without delays.
“There really doesn’t seem to be enough vets to do the testing.”
Armbruster suggested there is still not enough information available
for the CFIA to make an informed decision about drawing the boundaries
of the smaller zone.
He said the wild elk, which have shown low levels of the disease in the
park area, can wander much farther from Riding Mountain than many
people might think.
“I think there’s very little science going into the formation of this
zone.”
Producers are frustrated and losing patience with the way the TB issue
is being handled.
Armbruster said the federal government should consider eradicating the
wild elk in areas of the park where the disease is known to exist to
get a better idea of its prevalence.
Unless government acts more decisively on those kinds of issue, it will
be hard to convince the U.S. that the disease is being managed
properly, Armbruster said.
