Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to speak today. My name is Linda Oliver, and I'm from Mozart, Saskatchewan, which happens to be one of the soggiest areas in Canada. My husband, Brian, and I operate a 250-cow herd. I speak only as a cow-calf producer, not as a mixed farmer.
There are three issues that I would like to address today. The first issue is that of AgriStability. Everybody—everybody—knows that it has failed the cow-calf producers. Following BSE day, on May 20, 2003, not one politician imagined that the effects of that disease would affect livestock prices for so many years in a row. That was the biggest problem. After that BSE day, there were two factors that came into play.
Number one, historically, cow-calf producers have been able to survive a lot. We've survived the problems on our own. After many calls to bureaucrats and politicians, we gave up and were left to survive on our own. But we have never experienced a year like 2010. That is on top of the BSE years. And AgriStability has given the cow-calf producers no cushion whatsoever to be able to buy hay or grain in this year.
The second thing that came into play is that agriculture ministers refuse to admit that AgriStability is the problem. Regretfully, they had not planned for disastrous incomes for so many years in a row; it's only meant to compensate if there is a disaster for a year or two. Mr. Vanclief established a new insurance program, and it was called CAIS. After his tenure, there were three short-term agriculture ministers: Speller, Mitchell, and Strahl. After many calls to them, none of them knew how to correct the mistake. Mr. Ritz came to the forefront in 2007. By then I believe the government had adopted the policy of “Too expensive, can’t fix it, won’t fix it.” I spoke to Jim Scott--and I spoke to him several times--in Mr. Ritz's Ottawa office. I'll never forget his quote. He said, “Yes, unfortunately, Mrs. Oliver, AgriStability does not work in this situation.” He went on to say that it would be too complicated and too expensive to correct. Mr. Scott has not returned my calls for the last year or more.
A disaster program such as AgriRecovery, to assist farmers in a situation that was beyond their control, should have been balanced right there and then. Governments need to be morally responsible. We should not have to resort to prodding.
I have two BSE examples.
BSE example number one: Sometime in 2004 we sold three cows at auction that were ready for slaughter. That means they are ready to be ground into hamburger. The average price for those three cows was $25.52. At Wendy’s, McDonald’s, or Burger King, the cost of the meat for their quarter-pounders was 2.05¢. They should have had a real hamburger sale.
BSE example number two: On BSE day 2003, we sold a 700-pound steer for $1.56 a pound. That was the top of the market, so I don't expect to get the top all the time. In the fall of 2009, 700-pound steers were selling for 85¢ a pound. I'll transpose that into wages. In 2003 I could earn $1,560 a week. In late 2009 I would only earn $850 a week. That's a huge difference. The difference is that if you and I make those same wages, we both have to get our living expenses out of it, but I still have to get my farming expenses out of that $850 a week. That's a huge difference. Actually, the cattle prices in the first half of this year have been comparable to the prices of 1988; they're within 2¢ to 3¢ to 4¢ of the 1988 prices. There has been a huge problem.
With AgriStability being a bust, AgriInvest becomes a joke, because AgriStability and AgriInvest go hand in hand. Cow-calf producers did not receive anything from AgriInvest either. Is it any wonder that cow-calf producers have no savings account left, no cushion to carry us through this second issue, which is AgriRecovery?
The July 8 announcement made by Mr. Ritz was that $30 per acre for drowned-out acres was to be given to grain producers province-wide. For some producers, maybe that payment was enough. But for those RMs that were declared disaster areas, more was needed. Mr. Ritz and Mr. Bjornerud should have realized that some areas were worse than others. Some of the farmers in our area absolutely mudded in. They had custom sprayers come in. The custom sprayers went in, made ruts, and left, because they couldn't complete the job.
To make matters worse, there was no mention of livestock in that July 8 announcement. Jill Clark and Tim Highmoor of Mr. Bjornerud’s office assured me all summer that they were monitoring the situation. I believed them. But the damage done by Mother Nature, when dealing with excess moisture, is far more complicated to assess when you are dealing with live animals.
Number one, we did have flooded hay acres. There was no compensation for that.
Number two, we did have flooded tame grass pastures. Cows were eating grass that was loaded with water and sorely lacking in nutrients. If the cows don’t do well, the calves don’t do well. Cows are coming home now in the fall at a lighter weight, which is another loss.
Number three, we did have flooded native pastures, and that is quite different. These are pristine ecosystems and will take seven to ten years to recover. How will we be compensated for that? You don't reseed native pastures.
Number four, mosquitoes were a huge issue this summer. They were unreal. We lost a whole breeding cycle on about 65 cows that we kept at home. Our calves will therefore be born a month later next year, so that's a long-term issue. The cows and bulls simply had things other than sex on their minds. Every day, they trampled a new area of pasture into mud.
Number five, we had to feed cows at home until June 23.
Number six, cows will not suck an udder that's muddy.
Number seven, there were death losses.
There are pockets in Manitoba and Saskatchewan where the conditions are absolutely, unbelievably, worse now. We have had a lot of rain and a lot of snow. We can't get out to the fields to get our hay bales home because we had a lot of rain and about 12 inches of snow that melted and sat there. Two weeks later we got 15 inches of snow. It sits there like an insulation, and we can't get out to the fields to get them. I don't know if there's any kind of helicopter relief or whatever.
I am speaking from one of the wettest pockets of a disaster area, and there are other areas that are just as bad—in the Interlakes in Manitoba, around Hudson's Bay, in Saskatchewan, and a strip in our area. It is absolutely incredible.
Because of the failure of the above two programs, it is impossible for cow-calf producers to make proper business decisions. It was beyond our control—BSE and then the weather of 2010.
Thank you for your time.