The future has been looking rosier lately for Manitoba bison producers as the BSE crisis begins to fade, and their provincial association wants to sustain the momentum.
In a bid to generate more public and producer interest in the industry, the Manitoba Bison Association will host the Great Spirit Show and Sale on March 31 and April 1 in Brandon.
With 20,000 bison in the province, optimism among producers is growing now that an export market has opened for animals younger than 30 months, which has helped restore profitability.
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After the breeding stock bubble burst in the late 1990s, many bison ranchers were caught with no immediate prospects for recovering their investment in animals bought at sky-high prices.
Then, just a few years later came the dark days of BSE, which left producers with virtually no commercial marketing outlets other than farmgate sales.
“A lot of people talk about how the beef industry got hit by BSE,” said association vice-president Leonard Chopp, who raises 130 bison near Vita, Man.
“But the bison industry really got hit hard.”
At that time, the only way of generating returns was to slaughter animals at small local abattoirs and sell the meat locally: burger by burger, roast by roast.
“There was no main distributor for bison meat,” he said. “Everybody went their own way and became marketers.”
Outlets have since opened that are selling meat to regular customers, he added.
Chopp admits that he, like many bison producers, got caught up in the hype surrounding bison in the mid-1990s. He bought bison calves for $3,500 each in 1993.
Trying to get his money back from the high-priced animals after the bubble burst has been a long struggle, he said.
“The meat is getting out there a little better than it has,” said Chopp.
“We are trying to do more promotion.”
With a government-certified mobile vending trailer, he sets up shop at regular locations every two weeks to sell packaged cuts to the public.
“Even though they may be paying a little more, they prefer bison. Let’s say you pay $3.60 a pound for ground bison, which is 80 to 90 percent lean. I don’t know where you could get that kind of quality with ground beef,” said Chopp.
“You’d have to take the leanest roast you could find, then grind it up into hamburger.”
Chopp recently set up a booth at the Polo Park shopping centre in Winnipeg, where he met the public and distributed pamphlets about bison meat and where to buy it.
Because the meat is still relatively new to the average consumer, the association’s goal is to convince people to try it and decide for themselves if it suits their fancy.
A lot of pressure has been taken off local producers now that a slaughter facility operated by the North American Bison Co-op in New Rockford, North Dakota, is accepting Canadian bison younger than 30 months. Recent auction results saw bison fetching $1.25 a pound, he said.
Although Manitoba producers would like to have their own facility, which would protect them from the future possibility that the border may close again, the North Dakota plant has the advantage of market access for packaged beef to the United States and the European Union.
