JANUARY 2017 • COUNTRY LIFE IN BC


21 No surprise about pipeline Food prices on the increase by DAVID SCHMIDT


VANCOUVER – Unlike many other groups, the Collaborative Group of Landowners Affected by Pipelines (CGLAP) is neither surprised by nor opposed to the federal government’s decision to approve Kinder Morgan’s twinning of the Trans Mountain pipeline. The group includes 95 landowners along a 60 kilometre stretch from Chilliwack to Langley covered by both the existing and proposed new Trans Mountain pipelines. While not opposed to the pipeline’s expansion, the group is demanding compensation for its impacts on their operations. Kinder Morgan has offered the landowners lump sum payouts but the group is holding out for annual payments. “We want annual payments because the pipeline is going to impact us and our heirs for years,” says CGLAP president Peter Reus.


Although remaining steadfast in their demands, he claims “it’s easier to deal with us than the Burnaby groups absolutely opposed to a pipeline.”


Reus says Kinder Morgan has told landowners they hope to start the project in September and he hopes it’s true, noting CGLAP has “spent a lot of time” on the project and wants an early conclusion.


That is unlikely. Urban activists have vowed incessant protests and legal challenges and the provincial government has yet to grant its approval. That approval depends on the project meeting the province’s five conditions, which BC premier Christy Clark says the federal government is “very close” to meeting but still needs to provide more details on the marine-spill response plan and the jobs and benefits accruing to BC.


Safety zone expanded to 60 metres


Of equal and perhaps even greater concern to CGLAP members is the National Energy Board’s new pipeline safety zone. The NEB recently expanded the zone from 18 metres (nine metres on each side of the pipeline) to 60 metres (30 metres per side).


Reus calls the new safety zone a “cookie-cutter solution for the whole of the country after an accident in Quebec,” saying it was imposed without any consultation with landowners. “This is the same as a right-of-way, but instead of being compensated as we would for a right-of-way, we get nothing,” he states.


He also notes it affects many more landowners than the old safety zone.


“The pipeline runs diagonally across my property and the wider zone now crosses into a number of neighbouring properties. People who have never had a right-of-way on their land now suddenly have a right-of-way.”


Although farmers may till and crop land within the safety zone, they must obtain permission before subsoiling or employing other tillage methods which go deeper than 30 cm. “If we apply for permission, it can take three days for someone to come out and approve it. With our wet weather, we often don’t have time to wait,” Reus says, adding the new rules “don’t add any extra safety to the pipeline.”


3rd Annual Bull Sale


HARVE T A GUSNGUS HEARTHEAR OF H VALL


HAR ART OF THE T E ALLEY HE ALLE


Sons & Brothers of these Powerful Bulls Sell


HARVEST ANGUS


Tom & Carolyn de Waal 4174 Cowart Road, Prince George, BC V2N 6H9 P: 250.562.5200


tom@harvestangus.com harvestangus.com


C: 250.960.0022


HARVEST ANGUSS ANGU OF TH VALLE


View the


Catalogue at BUYAGRO.COM


HEART OF THE VALLEY FARMS


Brad, Aleta, Hayes & Cowan Chappell 6409 Tsolum River Road, Courtenay, BC V9N 7J3 C: 250.897.0619


P: 250.337.8097


With guest Walkerbrae Farms


rdangus@telus.net or heartqh@telus.net


MARCH 11, 2017 BC LIVESTOCK WILLIAMSLAKE, BC


by PETER MITHAM


VANCOUVER – Any increases in Canadian food prices will be felt most in BC and Ontario in 2017, but will the farmer benefit? Not likely.


The latest edition of the annual food price report (formerly produced by the University of Guelph’s Food Institute and now written by researchers at Dalhousie University in Halifax) forecasts a 3% to 5% increase in food costs in 2017.


While supply managed commodities will show little change, the cost of just about everything else except cereal will rise at 4% to 6%.


Demand for beef will help push meat prices higher, while weather and exchange rates will boost the cost of fruit and vegetables.


“Price increases will largely be due to the expected falling Canadian dollar value in 2017,” the report states. “Given how many food products we import from abroad, it makes our food economy highly vulnerable to currency fluctuations.”


The rise in food prices could cost the average family upwards of $420 in 2017 – cash that probably won’t find its way to farmers.


“Will some of those effects filter down to the farm level? Well, I don’t see why they would if the effects at the farm level don’t trickle up to the retail level,” says Jim Vercammen, a professor of food and resource economics with UBC’s Faculty of Land and Food Systems and the Sauder School of Business.


He points to the way retailers are more likely to pass price increases at the farm


level on to consumers than they are to pass on cost savings.


“When you have downward movement at the farm level, retailers are pretty sticky to move their prices down,” Vercammen says. “But when you have a surge like we had in 2008 or 2012 in raw commodities, then they’re very quick to say we need to pass this on to consumers, so there’s a real asymmetry there.”


In fact, while farmgate prices for many products fell this year, the big retailers turned around and asked vendors to reduce their wholesale prices. Consumers, however, still saw prices increase by an average of 2.5%.


Supply-managed prices drop


Fruits and vegetables posted the greatest increases, while supply-managed commodities actually fell 0.7%. “The farm prices have fallen a lot and retail prices haven’t budged, so somebody’s putting that money in their pocket, and it isn’t farmers,” Vercammen says. Vercammen favours modest growth in grocery prices this year versus the Dalhousie estimate.


Retail grocery prices have fallen for ten straight months in the US, he said, and with the dollar already trading at relatively low levels, he’s not sure it can fall much further. He believes it’s settled in a stable range, especially as oil prices strengthen. Couple these factors with a large grain harvest in the US, he doesn’t see any surge in prices for commodities.


“I don’t see any reason why we would expect to see a sharp increase in the coming year,” Vercammen says.


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48