Producers rebuilding herds The census was taken last May when livestock prices were low and grain prices were up
Martin Unrau figures the 2011 Census of Agriculture missed the real state of the cattle industry by a year.
“I think if the census was this year, the cattle industry story would be different, stronger,” the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association president said.
Census day was in May 2011 and last week’s first release of the resulting agricultural snapshot by Statistics Canada showed a livestock sector in decline, far eclipsed by resurgence in the grain and oilseed sector.
In 2011, grain and oilseed farms represented 30 percent of operations, while beef farms were close to 18 percent. Five years earlier, the split had been even.
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More dramatically, gross farm receipts in 2010 for grain and oilseed farms were up almost 50 percent from five years earlier to $18.2 billion. Beef receipts declined 25 percent to $7.3 billion.
Grain Growers of Canada executive director Richard Phillips said the shift was simply a reflection of commodity prices.
“What has happened is that livestock prices were struggling and grain prices are up,” he said.
“Farmers say, ‘show me the money,’ and they go where the money is.”
Statistics Canada said part of the reason for the decline is that Canadian consumer demand for beef has fallen. Per capita consumption of beef has fallen 5.1 percent since 2006.
However, Unrau said the industry has been turning around.
“I think when the census was done, we were at a point where a lot of older producers had not been able to leave the industry because of losses after BSE, and they had reduced their herds,” he said.
“I think now we are seeing a rebuilding of the herd. Heifer retention is up and prices certainly are better.”
He said the most important struggle facing the industry now is the retention of infrastructure, including slaughter capacity in packing plants.
“A real issue is keeping that infrastructure in place while we rebuild,” he said. “Do we have enough cattle to sustain the capacity we have and will it be there when we have larger herds and need capacity?”
The census also showed the results of hog industry turmoil during years of financial losses and a government program to buy out producers who wanted to leave the industry.
The value of hog sales plummeted 33 percent to $6.2 billion between 2005 and 2010.
The number of pigs in the national herd fell almost 16 percent to slightly less than 13 million.
Ontario saw the largest decline in its hog industry since the last census.
