ST. JOHN’S, Nfld. – The Conservative election campaign pledge to relegate the unpopular CAIS program to the dust bin of history increasingly looks like a policy that keeps the basic elements of the program and tries to make them work better.
Federal and provincial agriculture ministers meeting in the Newfoundland capital June 26 agreed that improvements already announced to the Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization program – inventory evaluation and broader negative margin coverage – will be coupled with administrative changes that make the system simpler and payments more timely.
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federal government proposed several months ago to increase the compensation rate from 80 to 90 per cent and double the maximum payment from $3 million to $6 million
That will be the core of the “new” program that will be in place for 2007.
All ministers agreed that Ottawa is correct to develop a separate disaster program, with details to follow.
And Ottawa says expansion of production insurance to cover livestock and some horticultural crops will be part of the mix.
All of this has federal agriculture minister Chuck Strahl insisting that the government is honouring its pledge to farmers to “replace” CAIS.
“It changes it in so many ways, in my opinion it will be a new program, especially with catastrophic disaster separated out,” he said June 26 at the ministers’ meeting.
“So it will be new programming with completely new national standards. I think if we can get that all done it will be such a 180 degree turn from what farmers are used to, in every way it will be new.”
There was no mention of a federal election campaign pledge that the CAIS replacement would take into account cost of production.
Provincial agriculture ministers who have insisted since the election that replacing CAIS with something entirely new is inappropriate were happy to let Strahl use whatever verb he preferred.
At their first meeting in March at Harrison Hot Springs, B.C., Strahl raised Conservative eyebrows when he emerged to say provinces wanted to keep the principles of CAIS so instead of being replaced, it would be “transformed.”
Rural Conservative MPs who had campaigned on replacing the program objected and Strahl soon returned to using “replace.”
Alberta agriculture minister Doug Horner said June 26 the debate about words is irrelevant.
“The language of replace or transform is really not the essence of the discussion,” he said. “The essence is we want to have a business risk management program that is relevant, that’s timely, that’s targeted to the producer’s operation, that’s there when he needs it, that he understands, that’s bankable and can be a management tool for him as well.”
Saskatchewan agriculture minister Mark Wartman said the federal government has done an “admirable job” of considering the provincial points and understanding them.
“I think where they’re going on income stabilization is within the changes we were looking for,” he said, adding that program principles of whole farm and margin-based are important to keep.
However, Strahl and provincial ministers agreed that keeping a stabilization program based on historic margins will not help grain and oilseed producers suffering from continuous years of low income and therefore low margins that do not trigger payments. It has been one of the major farmer complaints.
Farm profitability is a debate for later, Strahl said.
“We need to get the foundations right, then leave them alone to do their work while we have other discussions about how to grow the market, how do we get farmers involved in the value added side of it, how we make them profitable, what responsibilities do we have as a government, what are industry and individual responsibilities,” said Strahl.
“Those are all discussions we need to have about the future.”
Horner was more blunt. Giving money to farmers who chronically do not make a profit is subsidy, not stabilization. Canada is going to World Trade Organization talks to oppose subsidies elsewhere.
“I think it’s important we don’t go down a road that’s going to make us look two-faced on subsidies,” he said.
