APAS is welcoming the Federal Government's investment of $100 million into the AgriRecovery program to help producers deal with the drought that's impacting producers from BC to Ontario.
However, President Todd Lewis says $100 million, sounds like a lot of money, but it won't go very far when you take into consideration it's to cover over half the country.
He says the drought stretches across more than half of our arable, agricultural acres when you look at all of Western Canada, and Northwestern Ontario.
He's hoping when it comes to AgriRecovery that the Provinces and Federal government move quickly to determine the need assessments to finalize the agreements, as there's a sense of urgency, especially in the livestock sector.
"Producers need to know what and if money is going to be coming. How AgriRecovery is going to work in their province, so they can make plans before those animals get sent to the market. Those animals are going to be hard to replace in short order. It'll take a number of years to replenish the herd. And you know, it's almost a perfect storm with the grain contract situation where, you know, grain producers are finding themselves in the pinch, trying to deliver on the contracts they've signed."
He notes, even with the crop insurance write-off, a lot of those crops are going to be combined even to get the 4 to 5 bushels an acre to put into the grain companies to try and get some of these contracts looked after.
Lewis says overall the drought has resulted in unprecedented losses for producers in Saskatchewan, and it's going to take years for some farms to financially recover from this year, but also to build up their breeding herd that had to be sold because of lack of feed.
He says a letter was sent to Minister Marit and the department last week with APAS and all the crop commissions as well as SARM.
"It's a fairly united voice that we want to see these improvements made, and it's important for our producers, both in the livestock and crop industry to be able to access AgriStability and improve AgriStability. So I think that's what we're looking for sooner than later from the province. We'll get through it. But we certainly know now's the time for governments to step forward and lend a helping hand."
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