New government funding for manure storage may save small Manitoba hog producers facing regulatory extinction, farm leaders say.
A winter-spreading ban for small farmers becomes law in two years, they add, and the $26.3 million in federal-provincial cash through the Manure Management Financial Assistance Program is badly needed.
“This program is definitely going to help,” said Doug Martin of Keystone Agricultural Producers.
“After three years of losses, your bank’s probably breathing down your neck, and then you have to build more storage and upgrade? The money’s just not there.”
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The new program will give farmers 75 percent of the cost of building new manure lagoons or repairing old ones, to a maximum of $250,000 per farm.
Larger hog operations have been banned for years from spreading manure on snow, but small operations were allowed to continue the practice under tightening restrictions.
However, winter spreading will be banned altogether in 2013 and all farms will be forced to have storage facilities large enough to hold more than a year’s worth of manure.
Most operations with less than 300 animal units do not have these storage facilities.
Manitoba Pork Council director Rick Bergmann said the new funding might allow small farms to survive the winter spreading ban.
“This will be instrumental in allowing a lot of family farms to stay in the game,” said Bergmann.
“A lot of producers that were under that 300 (animal unit) threshold were really wondering what their future was.”
Federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz said the funding will help farmers not just store but also treat manure so that phosphorus levels can be controlled.
“The adoption of these technologies will reduce the volume of manure that needs to be hauled, thereby cutting transportation costs, and will decrease the risk of manure runoff from fields in the spring,” said Ritz.
“While our government is dedicated to protecting the natural landscape and water, we’re not about to let our producers carry that cost on their own.”
