Good morning.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to address you today.
Thank you for the opportunity to provide a briefing on the status of B.C.'s flood recovery efforts. I'm joined today by FCC senior vice-president Don Anderson, who is responsible for our customer-facing teams in B.C. and Alberta.
FCC is a self-sustaining federal Crown corporation that provides financing, software and advisory services designed for the Canadian agriculture and food industry. We are Canada's leading agriculture and food lender, with a loan portfolio of more than $44 billion. FCC serves all agriculture and food-processing sectors, and we have more than 2,100 employees working out of our 101 offices across the country.
In B.C., FCC has $2.9 billion in loans outstanding to primary producers, and another $876 million to agribusiness and agri-food operators. Prior to the flooding in question, our teams located in Abbotsford, Surrey, Kelowna and Duncan were actively reaching out to our customers, as many producers in B.C. were impacted by extreme heat and drought conditions during the 2021 growing season.
In the days and weeks following the devastating November flooding and erosion in parts of the B.C. interior, the Lower Mainland and on Vancouver Island, FCC has worked with customers facing significant losses and financial hardship. Examples of losses include buildings, equipment, livestock, feed and productive land for crops. The personal and business property damage has been extensive. For some, the cleanup and recovery may have impacted their operations for days or weeks. For others, the production disruption may be felt for months to come. And for others yet, such as those in blueberry operations, the impact could last for years. It is safe to say that the circumstances will vary significantly and will not be fully understood for several months.
The public infrastructure damage and the impacts to highways and rail transportation have been extensive as well. For local producers, this has curtailed their ability to obtain supplies, like feed, to sustain their operations, materials to rebuild and access to area processors. For food processors and logistics companies that move perishable food products to grocery stores across Canada, the supply chain disruption contributed to an already challenging situation.
Upon hearing of the magnitude of the flooding in B.C., FCC sought immediate approval from our board of directors to launch a customer support program that mirrored FCC's response to industry disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. More specifically, we offered loan payment deferrals that could include both principal and interest for up to six months, or interest-only for a full year. To date, 28 customers on 53 loans representing $34.2 million have taken advantage of this offer. The volumes are concentrated in greenhouse, hay farming and blueberry operations. Livestock loan deferrals to poultry operations are $3.8 million. For dairy farms, loan deferrals total $2 million. Emergency credit lines of up to $500,000 are also available, and there has been some limited uptake so far on that offer.
Recognizing that the needs would stretch well beyond what FCC could do with financing, we also provided a $100,000 donation to the BC Agriculture Council, or BCAC, to help relief efforts for the industry. BCAC is a non-profit council of agriculture industry associations that advocates for the interests of the province's agriculture and food producers.
All FCC customers in affected areas have been contacted and invited to reach out to us to discuss their individual situations and options. Although the early uptake on customer support may be limited to date, we will continue to work with our customers as they develop a better understanding of their financial impacts.
To assist in the continued recovery effort, there are areas that we continue to monitor. We are keeping a close eye on the following: impacts to the livestock sector, including recovering feedstock and longer-term facility repair and rebuilds; impacts to the crop sector, where we're paying specific attention to blueberry and crop land productivity and possible soil contamination as a result of the flooding; impacts to the agribusiness and agri-food processors to monitor lingering supply chain disruptions; and the overall mental health of area producers and our FCC teams to understand the effects of the very stressful events of the past year.
The early days of this disaster were marked by images of the community pulling together to protect livestock and take care of their neighbours. Now, as the infrastructure heavy lifting begins, we continue to monitor the situation and look forward to more progress in the months ahead.
In closing, FCC remains committed to supporting our customers and the broader B.C. agriculture value chain through these challenging times.
Once again, thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today.