I apologize to the translators and to our francophone members. I speak two languages, English and Ukrainian, but that wouldn't do us much good in Quebec.
Most of that was preamble anyway. We'll get into the meat of the matter right now.
As an independent consulting firm delivering services to farmers, our experience has been that we have been very frustrated with our ability to tap into and to facilitate programming to farmers. I do not believe that either the provincial or the federal government has the resources to deliver these programs en masse to farmers. I believe it's essential for government to look to the private sector as a vehicle for delivering some of these programs. I'll give you three concrete examples in the short time I have with you.
The first is environmental farm plans. Many of the farmers and growers I work with personally are very busy people—and in our organization we work with hundreds of farmers, if not thousands. They have neither the patience nor the time to sit through some of the processes involved in the environmental farm plan.
We had put forward a process whereby we would train our people and qualify them for delivery of environmental farm plans with our clients. We're intimately aware of our clients' operations, and we could facilitate this work in a very pragmatic fashion. Last year we hired a gal from RBC. She joined Agri-Trend, and we put her into training with the Alberta Environmental Farm Plan Company.
We delivered two farm plans to our clients. We had another 26 binders that were going to be delivered to her. At the last minute they changed their mind and pulled the program. That young lady was out of a job, and she subsequently had to take a job with Agricore United. We were out about $15,000 to $20,000 in investment and training. Needless to say, I was very upset, because many of the farmers we had targeted for delivery of that program still have not gotten their environmental farm plan numbers, and it's doubtful when they will.
Once you get your environmental farm plan number, you can qualify for national farm stewardship funding under 26 different programs that the government has laid out. The problem is the time lag. This morning I was on a phone call with one of our agri-coaches in Manitoba, Nelson Moorhead, of Hamiota, Manitoba. Nelson has informed me that several of his farm clients have been waiting eight to ten months to get their approval numbers on the projects that would qualify under national farm stewardship funding.
You only have to look outside to know that we deal in a biological business. Farmers cannot proceed with the expenditure of money under their proposed plans until they receive their numbers. If they don't receive their numbers, they can't proceed with the program, because you can't have an invoice that's generated before you receive your approval numbers on the application for national farm stewardship programming. But the program is simply taking too long.
The lag time is unacceptable. Once a farmer has his environmental farm plan number, it shouldn't take that long to go through and figure out whether he qualifies for a GPS guidance on his sprayer, support with nutrient management planning or pesticide planning, or work on manure management changes on his operation. It has just been taking too long.
Right now, we estimate that there are well over $200,000 worth of plans just in our own organization, waiting for approval. They're all just jammed up and waiting to get through the system.
The last area I'd like to spend time on is specialized business planning services. I have provided for you documentation that will be made available later. I apologize that I didn't have both English and French ready to go.
An example of specialized business planning services is the agriculture policy framework. Last year, in 2006, we began to work with a pilot to deliver specialized business planning services to our clients across Canada. We worked with the Regina office of renewal. We sent them six pilot forms that were accepted under the specialized business planning services. We developed a process that we were going to take the rest of our farm clients through.
We visited Regina several times. Regina had indicated to us that they had briefed the rest of the country on our willingness to take specialized business planning services through to our clients. I asked if we had to fly to Ottawa. They said no, they had briefed everybody. We turned on the switch. Two hundred and fifty farmers began moving through the process. One hundred and fifty applications were prepared and submitted. They began hitting desks across the country. They began hitting renewal desks across this country, and everything ground to a halt.
Edmonton felt that there weren't enough details. Regina said these were the best they'd ever seen. Ottawa was caught in the middle somewhere, not knowing which way to provide leadership. It was nothing short of a disaster.
We had invested over $250,000 getting our team ready and programming our systems and providing for that to move forward. Not only did we lose capital, we lost a tremendous amount of face with our clients and throughout our network of agri-coaches.
Right now, I understand those original six applications have indeed been approved for funding under the specialized business planning services. I was in conversation with Ottawa and asked them to please provide us with a template of what they would like us to deliver under specialized business planning services. They told us to refer to appendix C. Well, I know appendix C. Appendix C is ambiguous. It's open to interpretation. I asked for the template, which you will see in the documentation I am still waiting for today.
It's clear to me that there are inconsistencies in the interpretation of these programs across this country. These programs can be very well delivered by the private sector, but there has to be consistency and clarity so we know what to do. Some of the ideas in the agricultural policy framework I have to applaud. I believe that many of the initiatives under the pillars are exactly where this country should be going. I don't think the agricultural policy framework should interfere with the farmers' business. But you know, if society wants to prevent cows from walking in a river or a stream and it wants farmers to fence off that river or stream, and the farmer has to put up a fence or drill a well, it will come with some costs. Farmers are more than willing to do this work, provided they're supported in the work society wants them to do.
As members of a private consulting firm, we stand behind the agricultural policy framework, ready to support it. But I have to say that up to this point in time, our experience has been extremely frustrating and very costly. And I would say that the progress we have made as an organization to help the government move it forward has been very, very poor because of lack of clarity.