OTTAWA — As the debate over changing the Western Grain Transportation Act continues, Garry Benoit worries the $100-million alfalfa dehydrating industry could be forgotten.
It is a fear the executive director of the Canadian Dehydrators’ Association is trying to correct with an education campaign for politicians and bureaucrats who will be making the decision on what happens to the Crow Benefit subsidy.
“If we lose the $14 million we get from that, it would be a very sharp blow to the industry,” Benoit said.
Reports that transport minister Doug Young intends Crow Benefit payments to the railways to end next year had him worried.
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The Canadian industry likely could not compete in vital foreign markets against heavily subsidized U.S. and European feed grains.
“(If the subsidy goes) the alfalfa processing industry will be left buck naked in the cold wind of competition while our competitors continue to be wrapped warmly in their blankets of subsidies,” Benoit said in a statement issued from association offices in Edmonton.
Eighty-five percent of Canada’s processed alfalfa is exported as feed in cubes or pellets. Most is produced in northeastern Saskatchewan, the Peace River region and in north-central and southern irrigation regions of Alberta.
The Crow Benefit is paid only on the processed alfalfa product.
It means traditional pay-the-producers schemes supported by Reform, the Progressive Conservatives when in government and now by some elements of the Liberal government, will not work for the industry.
Benoit said it would require a decision by the government to treat the processing plants as producers for the purposes of the legislation.
