Canada will be able to meet its July 12 deadline for enhanced removal of specified risk material in packing plants despite some bureaucratic bottlenecks, questions about smaller plants and industry panic, MPs heard last week.
Representatives of the federal government and the prairie provinces told the House of Commons agriculture committee Feb. 28 that federal-provincial funding deals will be announced soon and plants will put together at least temporary systems to handle the SRMs.
“I think you’re hearing from the federal government and from the three provinces represented here that we can and will meet the deadlines,” Allan Preston, Manitoba’s assistant deputy agriculture minister, told MPs.
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“Whether we use May 1 as the functional deadline and July 12 as the regulatory deadline, we will meet those deadlines.”
However, he said the systems in place by summer “will be different from the long-term solutions that’ll be in place in two, three or five years down the road.”
Brian Evans, chief veterinarian from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, said Canada cannot afford to miss the deadline. It could jeopardize Canada’s ability to win an international designation as a controlled-risk country for BSE.
“We believe we need to stay the course and are confident that everything will be done at all levels to allow the industry to meet the deadline of the enhanced feed ban to maintain public and consumer confidence within Canada and beyond,” said Evans.
It was a far more optimistic message than the industry responsible for implementing the ban delivered to the Commons agriculture committee just two weeks earlier.
Canadian Meat Council president Jim Laws said disposal of tonnes of segregated SRM material will be a “staggering challenge” and a huge cost, and government money had not been made available to help plants make investments.
Kathleen Sullivan from the feed manufacturers’ sector said the effective deadline is May 1 if they are to keep SRM material out of feed that will be consumed after July 12. The enhanced ban will keep SRM material out of all ruminant feed, fertilizer and pet food.
“The enhanced feed ban is an immensely complicated initiative,” she warned.
Last week, the government officials said federal-provincial agreements for funding soon will be announced with provinces covering at least 40 percent. Industry also will be expected to pick up some of the cost.
Saskatchewan and Manitoba are each allocating in the $7 million range as their contribution. In Alberta, the funding amount is not yet available, but officials say it will be more than 40 percent of the federal contribution.
Despite their certainty that the deadlines will be met, officials conceded that it will be more difficult for the smaller, provincially licensed abattoirs to comply, but they produce little of the material.
In the absence of financial incinerator construction, new segregated lines or landfill agreements, plants will be expected to make temporary arrangements to dispose of or store the SRM material.
Not all MPs indicated that the new happy talk was convincing.
“I share the concern, it’s more a shock almost, that four months before the deadline we still don’t have agreements,” said rural Ontario Conservative Barry Devolin.
Liberal agriculture critic Wayne Easter, who was responsible for instigating last week’s meeting of the committee, said the industry message produced “absolute shock” and showed a lack of government leadership.
“If we don’t meet the deadline, we’re certainly going to be asking for compensation for the farm community because the farm community cannot bear these costs,” he said. “They should understand that up front.”
