Oats could become Western Canada’s third most important crop, surpassing barley, says oat expert Randy Strychar.
However, it has to regain the U.S. horse feed market to do that, and that’s proving to be a hard battle to win.
“We don’t have an edge, and that’s what we need to look for right now,” Strychar told the Prairie Oat Growers Association annual meeting in Winnipeg Dec. 1.
“We do not have an edge over corn, barley or wheat mids.”
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Strychar said the oat industry needs to fund research to prove oats’ superiority to other cereal grains as a horse feed, produce better feed oat varieties and convince manufacturers to list oats on feed bags so that buyers can deliberately buy oats.
Canadian oat shipments to the U.S. horse market have fallen to about 200,000 tonnes from 1.1 million in the early 1990s.
The collapse began with high oat prices caused by droughts in the early 2000s, which severely reduced supply. High prices caused manufacturers to look for other cereal grains and energy for their horse rations.
At the same time, claims that oats and starch in general were hurting horse health became widespread and the “internet express” spread the claims to American horse owners who began looking for alternatives.
Oat prices have since fallen relative to corn, which often replaces oats in feed rations. As well, researchers have rejected claims that starch is bad for any but a small percentage of old horses and ones with metabolic diseases.
However, demand has not surged back.
Strychar said horse owners, veterinarians and researchers like oats.
“But they don’t demand it,” he said, calling for more research to be done proving the superiority of oats.
Strychar said a key problem is the way horse feed is sold in the U.S.
Bags do not say what grain is in the ration, other than “grains” or “grain products.”
Even if horse owners want to buy a feed with oats, they can’t easily discover whether their rations contain oats as opposed to corn, barley or wheat mids.
Compounding the problem is the financial crisis that began in 2008, which has forced many families to give up their horses.
Horse feed is not a discounted product, like feed wheat or barley, so losing that demand means losing a premium market.
Most of the value of the oat industry now comes from the crop’s use as a human food, and millers at the conference encouraged farmers and researchers to keep that in mind.
The milling market pays high prices and is a consistent buyer. The horse feed market is secondary.
However, Strychar said oats will be a competitive crop only if demand grows, and milling demand is growing only one to two percent per year.
The horse feed market needs to be regained to significantly boost demand, which will allow farmers to grow more at good prices.
Demand would grow 190,000 tonnes per year if half of the U.S.’s nine million horses ate one quarter of a pound of oats more per day, he said.
