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Originally published:

MAY 2021
Vol. 107 Issue 5

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Stories In This Edition

Water licence angst

Green gold

Pandemic puts pinch on finances

Province to lift restrictions on second homes

Editorial: On the level

Back 40: Asian giant hornets aren’t welcome here

OpEd: Proposed meat regs a step in the right direction

Province plans pilot for new drought ratings

Sidebar: Universal

High snowpack limits drought

Jack Frost nips potential for huge cherry crop

Ag Briefs: Dog attacks put sheep producers on alert

Ag Briefs: Poultry scholarship established

Ag Briefs: BC Tree Fruits extends CEO contract

Letters: Build soil with carbon tax

Funding revived for local gov’t agriculture plans

Sidebar: Mission expands definition of accessory use agriculture

Record funding flowed through IAFBC last year

Lotsa tomatoes

AgSafe embraces new governance structure at AGM

ALR exclusion fails to win ag committee support

BC dairy industry sees steady demand

Dairy producers work to resolve quality issues

Tree fruit consultations off to flying start

Canada holds off Asian giant hornet restructions

Strawberry groewrs eye new varieties

Funding stopped up for raspberry replant

Beekeepers welcome technology transfer program

Island couple step up to revive local abattoir

Tech crucial to speed variety development

Research: Urban farms can contribute to food security

Building soil structure with organic compost

Locally grown asparagus fills a niche market

BC propagator awarded research grant

Understanding the methodology to farm financing

Seed bank continues legacy of seed-savers

New owners to extend Woodside Farm’s legacy

Ruckle Farm looks toward the future

Farm Story: Spring deliveries inspire the urge to get farming

Farmer-chef connections still paying off

Woodshed: Henderson between a rock and a hard place

Pandemic forces BC agricultural fairs to adapt

Jude’s Kitchen: Herbs & sprouts

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3 weeks ago

It’s been four years since the last tulip festival was held in Abbotsford, but this year’s event promises to be an even bigger spectacle than ever. Spanning 27 acres along Marion Road, Lakeland Flowers will display more than 70 varieties of the spring blossom, including fringe tulips and double tulips, the first of six months of flower festivals hosted by the farm. Writer Sandra Tretick spoke with Lakeland Flowers owner Nick Warmerdam this spring to find out how the floods on Sumas Prairie in 2021 have had an impact on his business plan as he transitions from wholesale cut flower grower to agri-tourism. We've posted the story to our website this month. It's a good read.

#CLBC #countrylifeinbc #tulipfestival
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Tulip grower makes the shift to agritourism

www.countrylifeinbc.com

ABBOTSFORD – On a bright sunny day in early April, Nick Warmerdam points out his office window at No. 4 and Marion roads to a spot about half a kilometre away across the Trans-Canada Highway.
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Omg 🥹 Jared Huston let’s go pls

4 weeks ago

Farming, like any other job.. only you punch in at age 5 and never punch out 🚜 ... See MoreSee Less

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Easton Roseboom Levi Roseboom🚜

4 weeks ago

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges.
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4 weeks ago

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year. ... See MoreSee Less

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year.
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Any other details for FVN and chillTV please? radiodon11@gmail.com

4 weeks ago

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agriculture's interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agricultures interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry.
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I sure hope part of that money is to educate the people in charge of the pumps and drainage system! They just relayed on computers and weren’t even physically monitoring the water levels. I’ve lived in the Fraser Valley my whole life and the old guys managing that system know how to do it. The new generation just sit behind computer screens and don’t physically watch the water levels. That system works very well when you do it right. The Fraser river levels are very important. The system is designed to drain the Sumas Canal (the part that runs thru the valley) into the Fraser. When they let it get backed up it put pressure on the dyke and the weak part burst. Simple science. And yes, the dykes need to be worked on too. Abbotsford has not been maintaining properly for years.

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Province to lift restrictions on second homes

Proposed regulation creates residential flexibility in the ALR

Meghan McPherson, with son Eric, 4, at a Courtenay dairy where she is employed, was among the first to speak out against legislation introduced in 2019 that would limit secondary residences on farm properties. The province has announced it will be revisiting those rules and making them more flexible CHRIS MCPHERSON

May 1, 2021 byPeter Mitham

VICTORIA – The province is preparing a new regulation to allow property owners in the Agricultural Land Reserve to have a secondary dwelling without Agricultural Land Commission approval.

“For almost 50 years, BC’s agricultural land reserve (ALR) has existed to encourage farming and protect farmland,” said BC agriculture minister Lana Popham said in Facebook post highlighting a factsheet on the changes. “It should go without saying that farmers need a place to live, and that many non-farmers live in the ALR. We are now finalizing changes that will create more residential opportunities in the ALR.”

The new rules follow a public consultation last year and will “provide more flexibility to help farming families thrive and to benefit non-farmers living in the ALR.” The consultation included submissions from 29 local governments as well as 257 individuals and associations.

According to the factsheet, the new rules will “enable ALR landowners to have both a principal residence (that could include a secondary suite) and a small additional residence, whether or not there is farming activity on the property.”

The changes please Meghan McPherson, a Comox Valley landowner who led the charge against the original regulation in 2019.

Critics argued that the restrictions on secondary residences limited the ability for extended families to live on the same property, impeded agritourism and left many unable to obtain insurance for existing dwellings that could not be rebuilt under the new rules.

“I’m hopeful that it will relieve a majority of the pressure that’s been felt by the housing restrictions,” she says. “We’re all on standby, still waiting for the official announcement on what the changes are going to look like so we can begin to make plans and proceed with our lives.”

District A Farmers Institutes president Raquel Kolof was also pleased with the change, which limited her ability to secure financing for an expansion of her farm in Gibsons.

“The proposed changes … would go a long way to help farmers stay afloat in these challenging times,” she says, noting the frustration the restrictions created for a number of families and small-scale farm operations.

Bill 52 was a surprise

The new regulation backtracks from an initial regulation designed to give force and effect to Bill 52, passed in 2018. Sprung without notice on property owners in February 2019, the new regulation was designed to support farming but effectively outlawed most forms of secondary residences.

Many landowners in the process of securing manufactured homes for their properties were caught offguard.

An outcry over the changes led to a temporary reprieve in which landowners were given extra time to obtain the permits and authorizations required to situate manufactured homes for immediate family members on their properties. It has been extended three times, with the latest extension running until December 31, giving local governments time to adjust their bylaws to accommodate the new regulations.

However, the adjustments may include implementing their own restrictions on the kinds of housing allowed on properties within the ALR. While some larger municipalities will likely try to contain residential development, McPherson hopes rural municipalities will be more lenient

“We’ve fought really hard to have access to basic, modest housing in rural parts of the province, and to then have local governments restrict that further is definitely a really concern for some people,” she says.

McPherson halted her own bid to place a manufactured home on her property because it would jeopardize her ability to rebuild the primary residence should it burn or otherwise be significantly damaged.

“That was too much risk for my family,” she says.

Happily, her neighbour’s property came up for sale, allowing her parents to move in next door.

But the changes probably won’t please everyone.

“There’s some people who proceeded with getting a modular home because they thought there was only a little window and it was their only opportunity to ever have a second house,” she says. “Now, any month or any week we could hear that they could have built a cabin.”

Nevertheless, the changes are probably the best property owners could have hoped for under the circumstances.

“She doesn’t completely want to rewrite the changes that she made, but she is trying to find reasonable flexibility for the people who are ‘non-farmers,’” she says, adding that it’s even better than a straight backtrack because a second home won’t be contingent on farming activity or the ALC. “What we’ll be left with, if the changes go through the way she’s implying it will, is … a better option than what was in place before.”

 

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