Manitoba
The numbers are in after the first year of a four-year pilot program offering price insurance to livestock producers.
The Western Livestock Price Insurance Program was announced early last year and modelled after an existing program in Alberta. It is intended to help producers ride out the highs and lows of the cattle market by locking in a floor price.
Since then, prices have hit record highs.
Alberta producers remain the top users of the program as of March 31, but tens of thousands of cattle in the other provinces were also insured.
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Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corp. chief executive officer Shawn Jaques said he expects participation to go up, even though the province didn’t pay out any claims.
“We are expecting more price in-surance policies to be purchased in this second year as producers be-come more familiar with the program,” he said.
“The strong livestock market means producers can protect some very high market prices should something happen to turn the market lower.”
Insurance for calves to be marketed this fall must be bought by May 28, but insurance for feeders, fed cattle and hogs can be bought at any time.
Participation in the hog program has been poor. SaskPork said when the program was announced that the sector would prefer a hedging program.
In Manitoba, a single hog policy for six hogs paid out $15 last year.
- Producers participating in program: 634 cattle producers, 9 hog producers
- Calves insured: 317 policies covering about 22,100 head
- Feeder cattle insured: 135 policies covering about 21,140 head
- Fed cattle insured: 9 policies covering about 540 head
- Hogs insured: 1 policy covering six animals, and the only payout in western Canada for a total of $15.
- There were 462 policies in total with coverage of $62.6 million
- Producers participating in program: 1,755
- Calves insured: 1099 policies covering about 123,000 head with $151 million coverage (15 percent of the marketable calf crop)
- Feeder cattle insured: 442 policies covering about 58,000 head with $95 million coverage (8 percent of the feeder cattle in the province)
- Fed cattle insured: 11 policies covering about 850 head with $1.9 million coverage (1 percent of the fed cattle in the province)
- Hogs insured: 0
- Number of WLPIP policies: 336
- Calves insured: 232 policies covering about 27,000 head
- Feeder cattle insured: 101 policies covering about 11,000 head
- Fed cattle insured: 3 policies covering about 250 head
- Hogs insured: 0
- WLPIP provided more than $53 million in price protection to the B.C. cattle sector. More than 20 percent of the 2014 calf crop had some level of price protection.
