If the BC NDP’s new aid package for apple farmers was an actual apple, it’d be a bruised, shrivelled-
up, tiny red Spartan, full of holes and hanging limply off the tree, just waiting to fall to the ground with
an ignominious little plop.
In fact, just calling it a government aid package is probably overselling it.
What New Democrats delivered Tuesday to tree fruit farmers was a paltry bump to an existing program that already fails to meet the needs of many, combined with a letter to Ottawa whining for help.
It was a disappointing outcome for farmers of apples, peaches, cherries, pears and other tree fruits,
who are still reeling at the sudden closure of the BC Tree Fruit Cooperative.
They had patiently waited more than two weeks for Premier David Eby to return from holidays so he
could assume the duties of his missing-in-action agriculture minister and sign off on some help.
“We know that there will be more to do,” Eby told reporters in Penticton on Tuesday.
“Our commitment is to continue to work with farmers, and key associations, to ensure that these
programs that we’ve announced are easy to access, that they make sense, that they work in a
coordinated way, but also to make sure that they are responsible to the evolving challenges faced by
farmers.”
BC government tops up unpopular program
Easy to access is not a phrase you often hear associated with the AgriStability program, which is
where the NDP allocated $15 million of its “aid package” on Tuesday.
The joint federal-provincial program has been criticized as inadequate by farmers who’ve been forced
to access it, alongside crop insurance, during several consecutive years of disastrous extreme
weather events.
Nonetheless, the province ploughed more money into the existing system to “top up AgriStability’s
existing 80 per cent compensation rate to 90 per cent on margin declines greater than 30 per cent.”
Farmers, who’ve paid thousands in fees to enrol in the program, might see more aid within a year.
The government accompanied that with a new $5 million “climate resiliency program” for farms to buy
equipment for extreme weather events — though it’s so small that even one large apple orchard could
exhaust the entire fund without even trying.
“Today’s announcement is just part of the work,” said Eby.
“We’re not foreclosing on any possible solutions that we’re going to come up with in partnership with
farmers.”
‘Growers need support immediately’
Not foreclosing, but also clearly not listening either.
Because the Eby administration has been told by numerous agriculture groups, multiple times, that
what they really need is access to interest-free government loans to help avoid immediate bankruptcy
while they rebuild and replant for the future. The kind of loans the U.S. government provides its cherry
farmers in Washington State when cold weather strikes, or Ontario provides its ginseng industry when
it is decimated.
“[The BC NDP] just don’t know how to move quickly.”.”
Kevin Falcon
In B.C., the cattle industry called for interest-free loans last year when it was hit by a feed shortage;
the wine industry called for it earlier this year when their crops were destroyed by a cold snap, and
now the fruit growers are calling for it again this summer — but the money has never materialized.
Instead, the premier went on a bit of a tangent Tuesday about the unfair subsidies that Washington
State is giving to its fruit sector, and the unfair aid that other provinces get from the federal
government.
He suggested exploring trade tariffs against the United States, and revealed he’d written a letter to the
prime minister demanding B.C. be treated more fairly on agriculture.
“We deserve the same treatment as farmers in Saskatchewan and Ontario and Manitoba and Alberta,
he said.
Good luck to the premier on both counts, but he might want to consider archiving his briefing materials
so his grandkids can one day pick up the file, because his esoteric cross-border tariff complaints
are unlikely to have moved a inch in the ensuing generations.
“Growers need support immediately, today, fast,” said BC United leader Kevin Falcon. “This is one of my great frustrations with an NDP government, they just don’t know how to move quickly.”
The NDP is proving its critics true. Too little, too late. An emerging theme when it comes to New
Democrats on agriculture.