Promotion and research | A Canadian hog industry checkoff could raise $2 million annually
Canada’s hog industry is trying to follow the beef industry model by establishing a levy-funded national Promotion and Research Agency.
However, it is proving to be a complicated inter-provincial process.
The initiative could give the industry close to $2 million in annual funding for research and promotion projects, but it will require provincial co-operation and national approval.
If established under the Farm Products Agencies Act, the agency would be funded by levies on domestic hog sales and on imports.
Canadian Pork Council communications director Gary Stordy said such an agency could produce $1.8 million in annual revenue for research and industry promotion.
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“I think we all want to move forward, and our wish is that in one year we can put in place an agency,” council president Jean-Guy Vincent said after an Oct. 25 council meeting.
“But there are complications, so I can’t say that will happen.”
The complications include getting agreement from provincial pork boards to co-ordinate their existing levy programs.
Legally, the industry can impose levies on imports only if there is a uniform national levy on production for research and promotion. The import charge must be no higher than the lowest provincial levy if there is no national levy rate.
Provincial levy rates vary, with the lowest in Saskatchewan at 75 cents per slaughter hog processed in the province.
“We have presented to provinces a plan to go forward with an agency,” said Vincent.
“The next step will be for provinces to change some rules because all provinces are not with the same rules. But at our meeting, provinces said they want to go ahead with the ability to have a checkoff on imported product.”
Stordy said the work could take a year or more.
The next five months will be spent consulting with producers and importers to find common rules and levy rates, followed by provincial changes and sign-off and approval from the National Farm Products Council of Canada and the federal government.
“It is reasonable to say the next steps are negotiations, although there is an industry agreement that this is something we should pursue,” he said.
This year, Beef Canada became the first sector to successfully jump through the hoops to form such an agency.
