WINNIPEG – Manitoba farmers who suffered a crop loss on lentils in 1992 will soon be getting another cheque from the Gross Revenue Insurance Plan.
The province has decided to pay $5.6 million to 991 lentil farmers after a Manitoba Court of Appeal decision ruled the government illegally reduced their 1992 coverage.
A group of farmers financed a lawsuit against the government after it retroactively changed their coverage levels for lentils from 70 percent to 58 percent in April of 1992.
Agriculture minister Harry Enns said the court decision required the government to pay only one farmer named in the suit.
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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
But applying the decision to all producers seemed “morally right” under the circumstances, he said.
“As minister of agriculture, I never did relish the idea of having to deal with my farmers in court,” Enns said.
He said the province will be paying farmers $7 million as a result of the decision, less the cost of the premiums they would have paid on the coverage.
Enns said although the pro-vince knew it could be challenged when it decided to reduce the coverage, it was under pressure from the lentil industry.
Lentil buyers and some farmers complained that support levels for lentils, based on historical averages, were too high for current market conditions and warned of huge acreage increases which would have devastated the market for years to come and possibly gutted the GRIP program.
Enns credited the province’s intervention for reducing the number of acres sown.
Crop insurance officials estimated the total payout otherwise would have been $38 million – more than twice what the province ultimately paid.
Even at the reduced coverage, lentil farmers were paid $11 million for losses on their 1992 crop.
