Federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz will receive a letter from the House of Commons agriculture committee recommending that he delay plans to end KVD as a seed registration requirement until the industry is confident a credible alternative identification process exists.
The opposition majority on the committee accused the minister of acting recklessly by announcing he was advancing by two years, to Aug. 1, 2008, elimination of the KVD test.
“What is at risk here is our quality control system and the minister jumped the gun,” said Liberal agriculture critic Wayne Easter.
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“He is coming in with a proposal without the assurances on the other side so our quality control system won’t be jeopardized.”
Conservative MPs complained that the opposition wanted to turn the clock back on a decision that will help farmers by allowing registration of grain varieties that are higher yielding or better suited for feed or biofuel use, but which cannot be registered now because they look too much like existing varieties.
“What this motion says is that we recommend the government abandon its plan to remove kernel visual distinguishability,” said Alberta Conservative Brian Storseth at a May 1 meeting of the committee.
“This would harm our industry. This would harm what western Canadian farmers and farmers across this country have been asking for and Mr. Easter knows that.”
Ontario Conservative Larry Miller called it an “anti-farmer motion” and insisted farmers want it and that the Canadian Wheat Board and the Canadian Grain Commission have said they can accommodate the new system.
“Let’s use a little bit of common sense instead of partisan sense and defeat this motion,” he said.
But all seven opposition MPs supported it against four Conservatives.
The prairie grain elevator industry has complained there is no credible alternative to KVD yet on the market. It said removal of the visual check will leave customers suspicious they are getting what they ordered, make the industry more liable to penalties and costs, and leave farmers responsible for making sure they are delivering what they say they are delivering.
Effective Aug. 1, the CWB says farmers “must sign a declaration … attesting to the eligibility and the variety you are delivering.”
Easter scoffed that simply was a way for the CWB “to transfer risk if there is a screw-up in quality to individual farmers who sign that declaration.”
He asked that the committee call CWB and grain commission officials to answer questions about how the grain quality system will be able to cope with the end of the KVD requirement.
However, Easter said he would not accept the word of chief commissioner Elwin Hermanson, a former Reform Party MP who once employed Ritz, and who was appointed last winter by the now-minister.
