Category: Canadian Agricultural Policy

Increased funding for business risk management programs is the main driver of a $23.1 million increase for agriculture in Saskatchewan's proposed budget. Deputy Premier and Finance Minister Donna Harpauer tabled the province's 2021-22 budget on Tuesday, featuring a deficit of $2.6 billion and a plan to return to balanced books in 2026-27. The budget includes... Read More

Health Canada just published final decisions for its special reviews of clothianidin and thiamethoxam last Wednesday. The organization has also opened up a 60-day consultation period on how plant breeding is done in Canada. Today's guest has a lot on their plate to discuss regarding these recent events, and how agricultural science is viewed by... Read More

With a potential federal election coming our way, politics are on the minds of many. This episode of RealAg LIVE! features Meagan Murdoch of National Public Relations, on some of Canada's key political conversations in 2021. Host Shaun Haney and Murdoch talk about partisanship, political party popularity (say that ten times fast), the carbon tax,... Read More

The reference margin limit (RML) of AgriStability was a feature put in place back in 2013 with Growing Forward 2, and since then has been a confusing and misunderstood feature of the program. The recent agreement to business risk management program reform has caused quite a stir, but what does the RML removal mean for... Read More

Health Canada has opened consultations on how Canada regulates plants with novel traits, including those produced through gene editing technology, such as CRISPR-Cas9. The 60-day consultation kicked off March 25th, and grain industry leaders are pushing for all those in the value chain to weigh in on the importance of the modernization of the regulations.... Read More

The federal government has the right to impose a national price on pollution, says the Supreme Court of Canada. That means the government can set the standard by which the provinces deliver carbon pricing. Several provinces and producer groups disagreed with the carbon pricing scheme — and still do, in principle — but with this... Read More

The most recent meeting of the Federal-Provincial-Territorial (FPT) ag leaders came to a conclusion Thursday without a consensus on Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) Marie-Claude Bibeau's proposed AgriStability changes. Devin Dreeshen, Minister of Alberta Agriculture and Forestry, says that the conclusion of the FPT meetings was a good deal for farmers, but the... Read More

The meeting of the Federal-Provincial-Territorial ag leaders ended without a full agreement on what Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Marie-Claude Bibeau proposed back in November, 2020. At that time, Bibeau offered to remove the reference margin limit and increase the coverage level from 70 per cent to 80 per cent. The cost structure of... Read More

A word that continues to surface when carbon offsets come up is permanence. The idea that longevity in the practices implemented in order to generate or claim carbon offsets needs to be defined. Dr. Mario Tenuta, professor of applied soil ecology in the department of soil science at University of Manitoba, says that it's a... Read More

The Supreme Court of Canada upheld the federal government's right to impose a price on carbon on provinces in a decision announced Thursday morning. The decision passed in a 6-3 ruling. The "price of pollution" is set to increase to $170/tonne by 2030. Agriculture producer groups and politicians opposed to the federal carbon taxation policy... Read More