Federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz says government help could be coming for British Columbia vegetable growers who lost crop late last year to heavy rain.
A producer told Ritz during an appearance before the Canadian Horticultural Council annual meeting in mid-March that rain devastated vegetable crops in the Fraser Valley.
Growers are looking for federal and provincial government help through the AgriRecovery program, he added.
Ritz was encouraging.
He said the B.C. government already has asked to start the process of evaluating need and eligibility, which typically takes four to six weeks.
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“We’ve started the process,” he said. “There is definitely a case for AgriRecovery in that area.”
Ritz also announced $743,000 to help Canada’s potato industry increase exports.
The bulk of the money will help the horticultural council develop promotional material for potential customers and fund overseas trade promotion and market development missions.
In addition, $55,000 will be used to study the feasibility of developing better on-farm record keeping using GPS technology.
Ritz said potato exports were worth $1.5 billion in 2008-09.
“The industry is a true Canadian success story,” he said. “Canadian potato farms are a mainstay in the Canadian agricultural landscape.”
MOTHER-IN-LAW POTATO
During his visit to the Canadian Horticultural Council meeting, agriculture minister Gerry Ritz told fruit and vegetable farmers about visiting South America, where producers grow 3,700 potato varieties.
One of them is the mother-in-law potato.
It is ugly and knobby but that is not why it got its name, Ritz said.
Instead, the local tradition is that when a suitor comes to dinner as part of his campaign to win a bride and impress her family, the potential mother-in-law cooks dinner.
If she peels the potato and all its contours, it means she approves of the potential son-in-law. If she cuts corners and simply slices the knobs off the potato, the suitor is not acceptable.
