WINNIPEG (Staff) – Manitoba’s sugar beet acreage is down significantly because of a late spring and high grain prices.
At 23,000 acres, it’s the smallest crop since 1979, and falls 5,000 acres short of what processor Rogers Sugar Ltd. expected this year.
And for the first time, the company had to sweeten the pot to entice farmers to plant beets.
Agricultural superintendent Don Petkau said the company started to become concerned in mid-May when only 20 percent of the crop was in the ground.
Sugar beets are usually sown during the first week of May. But this year, cold weather and flooding in many beet-growing areas delayed seeding by as much as a month.
Read Also
Agriculture ministers agree to AgriStability changes
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
Petkau explained farmers are paid for the sugar content or quality of their beets. The crop needs a long growing season.
“The later they put the crop in, the bigger whammy they get,” Petkau said.
Meanwhile, grain crops became attractive because of high prices.
“That’s where we lost probably a lot of our crop,” said Petkau.
So in late May, Rogers told growers it would pay them $100 for every acre they planted after 70 percent of their contracts were fulfilled. A farmer with a 100-acre contract would receive $3,000 if all 100 acres were planted.
Ken Yuill, president of the Manitoba Sugar Beet Producers Association, said the bonus was attractive enough to draw some farmers back to the crop.
Nothing exceptional
Petkau said he anticipates the crop will be of average quality.
“The crop went in real late, but with adequate moisture and heat conditions through June, the crop makes up for lost time,” he said.
He expects the sugar plant will take in about 300,000 tonnes of beets in the fall. In 1988, a drought year, the plant had one of its smallest campaigns at 225,000 tonnes.
Yuill said the small crop adds to the concerns about the industry’s future in the province. He hopes to soon see a government task force report on options.
Meanwhile, Alberta sugar beet growers planted about 34,000 acres. Marketing board president Mark Kuryvial said seeding started about a week later than usual, but the acreage was on target and the crop looks good.
Alberta growers were not offered an incentive by the Rogers plant in Taber.
