The ground may be shifting under the federal government’s previous commitment to end KVD’s role in grain variety registration by 2010.
Last week, agriculture minister Gerry Ritz said he would prefer to have the kernel visual distinguishability test removed by Aug. 1, 2008.
While Ritz did not announce that he was officially moving up the date by two years, an Agriculture Canada insider said it was meant to be a clear signal to the industry that the minister wants the sooner date.
“This clearly is a signal of what the minister wants to see happen and it is not inappropriate to connect the dots,” he said.
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Ritz made his comments in response to a call from the Canadian Seed Trade Association that KVD requirements end this year.
CSTA first vice-president Jeff Reid said the government should announce a policy and timing change before wheat variety registration committees meet to make their recommendations in late February.
“If they don’t understand that there is a new date and new rules taking effect this year, then varieties that could be recommended will not be under the KVD rule and another whole year will be lost,” he said. “Investment in variety development and innovation is being delayed.”
While the Ritz comment was helpful, “I think the minister’s office has to be more clear that the date is now Aug. 1, 2008,” said Reid.
At the Western Grain Elevator Association, executive director Wade Sobkowich was uneasy about the minister’s statement.
He said the grain industry has been working hard to find a way to implement the 2010 deadline for ending KVD requirements on major grain classes.
“We consider that an ambitious timetable and 2008 simply is not workable,” he said. “We as an industry are not ready.”
In part, he said, the problem is that the Canada Grain Act must be amended to impose penalties on those who misidentify their grain because until there is technology to test grain in the driveway, the class assigned to delivered grain will depend on honest and accurate reporting and identification.
“A change in the legislation is the only basis upon which we could proceed,” said Sobkowich.
“We don’t know why he would say what he said. We know that’s the minister’s personal position but he must understand we can’t remove KVD and then move into nothingness.”
During a Jan. 23 news conference, Ritz was asked for his position on the seed trade association call for a 2008 end to KVD.
“I firmly agree with them,” he said. “My personal position and policy on that has been and will continue to be a complete removal of KVD on all classes by Aug. 1 of 2008.”
Grain Growers of Canada executive director Richard Phillips said his group is starting to hedge its support for 2010.
During a meeting last November sponsored by the grain growers and the Canada Grains Council, the consensus was that while removal of KVD requirements from the system is a good goal, it should not be implemented until the industry has the technology and policies to make the change credible to customers.
The meeting agreed that 2010 was a reasonable end date.
Phillips said the Grain Growers group has been lobbied both by those who want to speed up the elimination of the KVD requirement and those who caution that moving too quickly will be a disaster.
“I think even if they move in ’08, we wouldn’t see classes into the commercial system without the KVD requirement before 2010 anyway,” he said.
“So we’re hedging our bets on it. We’re now saying no later than 2010 for everything.”
