Manitoba’s agriculture critic appealed to the province last week to implement a feed freight assistance program for livestock producers.
Ralph Eichler said producers are facing feed shortages in districts where pastures and fields were flooded earlier this year.
Still reeling from the effects of the BSE crisis, those producers must now haul feed and straw from elsewhere at a time when transportation costs are soaring, he added.
“The minister (of agriculture) has just been putting us off and putting us off and she’s refusing to acknowledge there’s a problem out there.”
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Eichler said the provincial NDP government reacted two years ago when drought robbed producers of hay and straw yields in several parts of the province. The feed freight assistance program that was implemented worked well and should be revived, he added.
“They don’t have to reinvent the wheel. The program actually worked quite well. The payments got out to producers in a timely manner and they were able to bring product in with some assistance from the province.”
Tom Crockatt, a cattle producer from Woodlands, Man., is among those facing a serious shortage of feed and straw this year.
He is still trying to harvest hay from fields that were flooded by exceptional rainfall earlier in the summer and estimates his hay production may be only half of normal.
Many cereal crops in his area drowned or weren’t seeded so he likely will have to haul straw from more than 150 kilometres away.
“The freight is going to be more than the straw is worth,” Crockatt said. “The freight is going to be more per bale than it costs to buy the straw, and we’ve got to have straw. We’re up against a couple of factors that we have absolutely no control over, which are the weather and the cost of fuel.”
This year has been one of the wettest on record in Manitoba. Flooding, a bizarre windstorm and tornadoes are among the weather extremes that farmers and rural communities have had to contend with.
“It’s not a good thing when you make the national news two or three times for flooding in the middle of summer,” Crockatt said.
