The federal and Ontario governments have agreed to cover some of the costs of moving prairie hay to areas of Ontario affected by the 2012 drought.
The announcement of public help for HayEast follows weeks of lobbying to have governments provide the same level of support they did for HayWest organized a decade ago to send hay from eastern Canada to prairie livestock producers suffering from a feed shortage after drought.
This year with drought in Ontario, the shoe is on the other foot.
Initially, prairie farmers were sending hay east with no transportation subsidy.
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Ottawa and Ontario now have announced that they will provide $500,000 between them to cover HayEast transportation costs.
Beyond that, they will match cash donations to the HayEast campaign to a maximum of $2.5 million.
Ontario Federation of Agriculture president Mark Wales said the government commitment will help meet the need.
“This support from the Canadian and Ontario governments will go a long way in helping to sustain livestock farms through the winter that would otherwise have had to ship their animals.”
Ontario livestock farmers have requested at least 60,000 round bales to feed their herds during the winter.
Early western hay shipments began to arrive in October, but without government help the effort was low-key.
Prairie farm leaders like Norm Hall from the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan said this week the government announcement of transportation help means the thousands of bales pledged by prairie farmers can get to eastern Canadian farmers who need the help.
