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Originally published:

APRIL 2022
Vol. 108 Issue 4

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Stories In This Edition

Taking root

No room

Farmland values soar

Orchardist grows international, domestic sales

Editorial: The choices we make

Back 40: Freedom has its boundaries in a civilized world

Viewpoint: Underinsured in a potential disaster zone

BCFGA sheds responsibilities, looks ahead

Province hikes minimum wage, piece rates

Climate Action Initiative disbanded by province

Dusty brown

Letters: Minister is misleading

Chicken growers on watch for avian influenza

Ag Briefs: OrganicBC pursues structural review

Ag Briefs: Online bull sale exceeds expectations

Ag Briefs: Groundwater deadline passes

Turkeys emerge from 2021 in a strong position

Sidebar: Benoit trades turkeys for flowers

Agri-industry project gets green light from ALC

Resilient cherry growers target exports

Labour shortage has abattoirs hogtied

No progress on livestock watering regulations

Soakin’ up the sun

Regenerative agriculture vision outlined

Strong yields and new strategy for cranberries

Tree fruit growers struggle to source plants

Fumigation options

Farm Story: Cull potatoes are about to earn their keep

Pilot program bridges the extension gap

There is a future for BC’s apple industry

A warming world calls for new strategies

Heat dome, cold snaps hit some, miss others

Boiler project cuts costs for Duncan farm

Woodshed Chronicles: A little tough love for Frank and Kenneth

Farm partnership supports local non-profit

BC entrepreneurs meet food waste challenge

It’s time to dust off the barbecue

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BC Cattlemen’s Association members gathered in Cranbrook for their 97th AGM last week. BCCA president Werner Stump welcomed upwards of 300 ranchers as he signalled a change in tone with the association’s approach to government. “We are going to be a lot more blunt in our dealings with government as we fight for our livelihood,” Stump told his audience. The North American herd size remains down, and calf prices are expected to stay strong, says Brenna Grant from Canfax. “We could see $5.50 -$5.70 this fall for a 5(00) weight calves.” Duncan and Jane Barnett and family from Barnett Land and Livestock in 150 Mile House received the Ranch Sustainability Award, which recognized their riparian management and community involvement. From left to right, Clayton Loewen with Jane, Duncan and Lindsay Barnett.

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BC Cattlemen’s Association members gathered in Cranbrook for their 97th AGM last week. BCCA president Werner Stump welcomed upwards of 300 ranchers as he signalled a change in tone with the association’s approach to government. “We are going to be a lot more blunt in our dealings with government as we fight for our livelihood,” Stump told his audience. The North American herd size remains down, and calf prices are expected to stay strong, says Brenna Grant from Canfax. “We could see $5.50 -$5.70 this fall for a 5(00) weight calves.” Duncan and Jane Barnett and family from Barnett Land and Livestock in 150 Mile House received the Ranch Sustainability Award, which recognized their riparian management and community involvement. From left to right, Clayton Loewen with Jane, Duncan and Lindsay Barnett.

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Congratulations!!!

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Congratulations Duncan and Jane Trott Barnett Well deserved recognition

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Congratulations to Duncan, Jane, and all the rest of the Barnett family!

Congratulations Duncan and Jane!!

Congratulations Jane and Ducan! Sandra Andresen Hawkins

Congratulations Jane & Duncan 🥳

Congratulation Duncan & Jane!!

Congratulations Jane Trott Barnett and Duncan!!!

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1 month ago

Grapegrower Colleen Ingram, who was recognized earlier this year as the 2024 Grower of the Year by the BC Grapegrowers Association. “Given the devastation we have had over the last three years, I feel like this award should be given to the entire industry,” she says. Her story appears in the June edition of Country Life in BC, and we've also posted to our website.

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Industry champion named BC’s best grape grower

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KELOWNA – Colleen Ingram’s enthusiasm for collaboration within the BC wine industry is so great that when she was named 2024 Grower of the Year by the BC Grapegrowers Association, she wanted to sh...
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2 months ago

From orchard manager to government specialist and now executive director of the BC Fruit Growers Association, Adrian Arts brings a rare blend of hands-on farming experience and organizational leadership to an industry poised for renewal. His appointment comes at a pivotal moment for BC fruit growers, with Arts expressing enthusiasm about continuing the momentum built by his predecessor and working alongside a board that signals a generational shift in agricultural advocacy.

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Arts leads BCFGA forward

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A combination of organizational management and practical farming experience has primed the new executive director of the BC Fruit Growers Association to lead the industry forward.
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2 months ago

A public consultation is now underway on the powers and duties of the BC Milk Marketing Board. Key issues for dairy producers include transportation costs, rules governing shipments and limitations on supporting processing initiatives. Stakeholders have until May 31 to comment.

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Milk board undertakes review

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A public consultation on the powers and duties of the BC Milk Marketing Board is underway as part of a triennial review required by the British Columbia Milk Marketing Board Regulation.
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Chicken growers on watch for avian influenza

Disease pressure, low prices follow disastrous 2021 season

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April 1, 2022 byPeter Mitham

ABBOTSFORD – With pandemic restrictions lifting and demand for chicken stabilizing, BC poultry producers are renewing their focus on biosecurity to stave off some well-known infectious diseases affecting their birds.

“Biosecurity continues to be a challenge for us,” BC Chicken Growers Association president Dale Krahn told growers at their annual general meeting in Abbotsford, March 1. Disease caps the now-familiar litany of afflictions the industry faced in 2021, including heat domes, forest fires, flooding, atmospheric rivers that strained supply chains, increasing costs and endangering human and animal safety.

The risks have quite literally gone viral as 2022 dawns, with highly pathogenic avian influenza and infectious laryngotracheitis (ILT) threatening flocks.

“The world is fighting with avian influenza,” says Krahn, noting that Europe, Asia, Africa and the US have all seen significant outbreaks, in some cases with heavy losses.

Atlantic Canada has reported an outbreak, and the virus was also identified in an eagle in Delta.

“Growers are reminded to continue their heightened biosecurity as we see health challenges approach BC,” says Krahn. “So far the BC poultry industry has had success staving this off by following our stringent biosecurity measures, which are continually updated by the BC poultry biosecurity committee.”

BC’s last significant high-path AI outbreak was in the winter of 2014-2015.

Krahn notes that strong biosecurity measures are important against a host of threats, including ILT.

“We know that the most likely route by which [the ILT] virus moves is on the wind from contaminated manure, or infected flocks being moved,” he says. “As a poultry industry, we need to work together to mitigate this disease.”

Rising costs

Growers continue to struggle with high costs that have eliminated margins and pushed many into loss positions. Despite two previous rejections for the A-173 and A-174 production periods, BCCGA is claiming exceptional circumstances for the A-175 production period in the hope of winning a price for growers that reflects production costs.

“Growers must have their costs addressed in any pricing solution for our industry to have any chance of sustainability,” says Krahn. “These cost increases, including feed, chicks, sawdust and energy costs – as the membership well knows – are far beyond what our growers can sustain, and for which the current BC pricing formula cannot account. These extraordinarily high costs are expected to continue for some time.”

Yet neither the BC Chicken Marketing Board nor BC Farm Industry Review Board have accepted the requests for adjustments to pricing, although BC Chicken has acknowledged the issue.

BC Chicken chair Harvey Sasaki told growers that wheat futures were $65 a ton higher than corn in June 2021, but the differential had increased to $177 a ton by December. Grower prices are based off corn, the dominant feed grain in Ontario, whereas BC growers use wheat. The huge differential is a huge pain for growers, on top of inflation-adjusted prices that are half what they were in the 1970s.

“Dale described it best in his presentation,” notes Sasaki. “That’s a pretty tough bill to be able to accommodate in the light of all these other challenges.”

BC FIRB took a hands-off approach at the meeting, saying industry must settle the pricing question itself.

“BC FIRB is looking to the chicken board, and the broiler hatching egg commission, as the first-instance regulators in the broiler chicken industry,” FIRB executive director Kirsten Pedersen told growers in response to questions.

Krahn was clear that the situation was dire before 2021, and is now unsustainable.

“We have said it consistently since 2016, and we continue to remind our governing bodies that chicken growers’ returns are not sufficient to meet their ever-increasing costs as they farm chicken,” he says. “We are farming our depreciation, and it is unsustainable.”

But there was some good news for growers on the financial front. BC Chicken returned $943,000 in surplus levies from 2019 to growers, and more could be forthcoming if challenges this year don’t intervene.

Chicken Farmers of Canada first vice-chair Nick de Graaf, a Nova Scotia producer, also urged growers to register for federal support through the Poultry and Egg On-Farm Investment Program, which compensates growers for market access concessions made under the CP-TPP and CETA trade deals with Pacific Rim and EU trading partners. BC growers have access to $48 million under the program.

“We don’t have to ask for the actual funds right away but we must all register. The challenge is that some farmers still haven’t,” he says. “I understand that not all of us will need or want the funds until later, maybe several years later, but we must ask you to register now.”

Registration will show appreciation for and demonstrate the importance of government support for the sector.

 

 

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