COUNTRY LIFE IN BC • NOVEMBER 2018 Buying stations


gain ground Fraser Valley cattle auctions come to an end as market changes


by PETER MITHAM ABBOTSFORD – Cattle


auctions are becoming a rare breed in the Fraser Valley as high land costs push producers inland. Beef numbers have dwindled in the Lower Mainland in recent years as producers decamp for the Thompson Okanagan and Cariboo, regions where land is plentiful and operating costs are lower. According to Statistics


Canada, in 2001 the Lower Mainland had 1,368 beef and dairy operations; by 2011, the number had dwindled to 836. The latest agriculture census in 2016 recorded just 692. The auction rings have


grown smaller as farmers left. McClary Stockyards in Abbotsford shut down July 1, taken over by Chilliwack Cattle Sales, which set up a buying station. October 2 saw the last remaining beef auction, Fraser Valley Auctions in Langley, sell its cattle division to Chilliwack Cattle Sales. Its remaining auction activities will take place on Saturdays. Brian Bilkes of the


Kooyman Group, which operates Chilliwack Cattle Sales, said the move would allow cattle sales in the Fraser Valley to consolidate at the former McClary site. The company has a 10-year lease on the property, and


cattle auctions will take place every Wednesday at 11am beginning with dairy cattle and followed by beef and feeder animals. “We are consolidating the cattle auction formerly at Fraser Valley Auctions to the former McClary site, now operating as Abby Stockyards Ltd.,” he said. “The buying station will operate Monday to Friday for slaughter cows and calves.” Bilkes added that the


Aquilini family is not involved in the venture, contrary to previous reports. Buying stations have been on the rise in BC. The arrangement allows owners to bring in animals and receive an offer from the buyer, which they can either take or leave. The process lacks the speed and excitement of auctions, which were as much about trading information and socializing as doing deals. Buying stations nevertheless offer the chance to unload animals for immediate cash. However, some producers


say the buying stations create a less competitive environment. The BC Livestock Producers Cooperative Association began in 1943 by ranchers wanting a fair price and guaranteed payout, something the existing system of “a guy with a pickup and a chequebook” didn’t offer.


SNOW JOKE! A blast of unseasonable weather hit the Cariboo, October 1-2, where cattle were easy to spot hiding under trees as cowboys started to round them up from their fall pastures. LIZ TWAN PHOTO


Buying stations hearken back to that era by working on an assessment of fair market value rather than a competitive bid process. “An auction market is a


price-maker; a buying station is a price-taker,” says Livestock Markets Association of Canada president Rob Bergevin, who runs Foothills Auctioneers Inc. in Stavely, Alberta. Auctions that operate in a


strong market offer “true price discovery,” he explains, something that doesn’t happen when a farmer brings cattle in off the street for consideration by one party. “There wouldn’t be any competitive bidding take place to reach a premium; it would just be kind of a current market assessment,


and hopefully you would be treated fairly,” he says. But not all regions can sustain an auction market. “The overhead at an


auction market needs the numbers or the volumes to sustain itself,” Bergevin explains. “The numbers in British Columbia would be substantially smaller than


what they are in Alberta, so potentially the ability for the auction markets to continue to sustain a level of business or those numbers may not be financially or fiscally possible.” Kamloops and Dawson


Creek are exceptions to the rule in BC because both are in


See MARKET on next page o


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