The Saskatchewan government has announced it will fully fund the 2006 CAIS program, several months earlier than originally planned.
In the spring budget, the government said it would decide by the third quarter financial results how much it could spend on the Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization program other than the base $100 million it had allocated then.
But agriculture minister Mark Wartman said last week’s first quarter results were strong enough that the decision could be made now and the government has added $60 million to its commitment.
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The provincial 40 percent share of CAIS is based on estimates provided by the federal government.
However, Wartman said the 60-40 funding split continues to be an issue.
“We need to see a change in this formula,” he told reporters. “By federal government decision (the elimination of the Crow rate) we have lost $1.5 billion a year over the last decade and these small fixes aren’t enough to really fix the problem.”
The province was able to commit more money to CAIS this year mainly because of higher resource revenues.
“Certainly our oil and gas revenues are up. Some of our other revenues are up,” he said. “They’re counterbalanced a little bit by some declines in potash, but with a strong economy, manufacturing, et cetera, we’re finding we’ve got the resources coming in.”
The agriculture department is now $71.2 million over budget, according to finance minister Andrew Thomson, because of the CAIS funding and the $18.2 million unseeded acreage payment announced in July.
