Federal regulations that require Canadian railways to move one million tonnes of grain per week could be lifted at the end of November.
Introduced earlier this year, Bill C-30, which requires Canadian Pacific Railway and Canadian National Railway to each move 536,000 tonnes of grain per week from Western Canada, expires Nov. 29.
Speaking in Saskatoon today, agriculture minister Gerry Ritz said the volume targets may not be extended.
“That’s one of the issues under discussion,” he said.
“It worked well. It got ships out of port and it got grain moving … but at the end of the day it is a blunt instrument. It does not serve short-line rail, anything other than primary (sites). It only serves them, so it’s fairly high level. It’s volume, not value.”
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The intervention came after a massive harvest in 2013 and a cold winter created a larger than normal carryout of crops and a backlog of orders for rail service in Western Canada.
CN was fined in September for failing to meet the target, while there are reports of short-line operators who remain months behind on orders.
“This year is more about value than volume,” said Ritz. “It’s about getting all of these multiplicities of grains out there scattered across Western Canada to meet at port so there are some synergies, so they can be blended and put on a ship…. It’s more about co-ordination.”
Canada exported over five million tonnes of wheat and over two million tonnes of canola this crop year as of Oct. 26, according to the Canadian Grain Commission.
