Faced with the imposition of a permanent moratorium on hog barn expansion in much of Manitoba, the hog industry has thrown a new bargaining chip onto the table.
Dubbed the zero percent solution, the Manitoba Pork Council is proposing that Bill 17 be amended to allow new and expanding operations to spread manure at rates that replace annual crop uptake.
“The solution is not in banning buildings and economic development, but in managing nutrients,” said council president Karl Kynoch.
The last ditch effort to modify the bill, which is headed for third reading in the legislature and could become law within two weeks, is the billion-dollar industry’s only hope for survival, he said.
Read Also
U.S. government investigates high input costs
The USDA and DOJ are investigating high input costs, but nothing is happening in Canada.
“Our No. 1 choice would be to just get rid of the moratorium,” said Kynoch.
“But what we’re saying is if you are going to put the bill through, at least put in a couple of amendments to allow this zero percent solution to work.”
With the price of phosphate fertilizer shooting up to $1,400 from $400 a tonne a few years ago, farmers recognize the value of nutrient-rich hog manure to give their crops a yield boost, he said.
“A lot of the public hasn’t realized that farmers look at manure as a very valuable resource. There’s no benefit to a farmer to not put it on at one times phosphorus removal.”
To keep transportation costs reasonable, the council’s proposal calls for farmers to be allowed to use hog manure at the annual crop removal rate as part of a five-year nutrient application program.
“If you were to apply 100 pounds of phosphorus, and it would take three or four years for the crop to use it, then you would not be allowed to apply any more to that land until the phosphorus has been used up,” he said.
“The end result is that, long term, you have no nutrient increase on the land.”
The council is also offering to accept a permanent ban on winter spreading, and a requirement that any manure spread on fields would have to be either direct injected or incorporated into the soil within 48 hours of spreading.
Incorporating or injecting manure into a field has been shown to bind phosphorus to the soil, preventing runoff during wet conditions, he added.
The council said hog producers are being unfairly blamed for the nutrient phosphorus runoff that is causing massive algae blooms in Lake Winnipeg. It says the industry is only responsible for 1.5 percent of the total.
Bill 17 was introduced in the spring on the heels of the Clean Environment Commission’s report last December into the environmental sustainability of hog production in Manitoba.
The bill would ban all new or expanded hog barns in the Red River Valley, the Interlake and the eastern part of the province, or roughly 6.5 million acres, unless they are equipped with anaerobic digesters or some other environmentally friendly system for handling manure.
Kynoch noted that 300 people, who made up 98 percent of all submissions during the public consultations held earlier this summer, had spoken against the proposed moratorium on hog barn expansion.
The council recently presented conservation minister Stan Struthers with its zero percent solution, which it says was taken directly from the environment commission’s report.
However, the government is holding its cards close to its chest, said Kynoch, and the risk that Bill 17 might become law is looming.
“I’m hoping that they will see this as a win-win for both them and the farmers,” said Kynoch.
However, Struthers told the Western Producer Sept. 15 that he had seen the proposal and was unmoved by it.
“Zero percent solution is an appropriate name for it because it contributes zero percent towards protecting Manitoba’s water,” said Struthers.
