THURSDAY, MAY 23, 2013
VOL. 91 | NO. 21 | $4.25
ON P6 BARLEY SPECIALISTS | GROWING CONTRACT
SERVING WESTERN CANADIAN FARM FAMILIES SINCE 1923
BUDGET | CUTS
Farm groups disappointed over cutbacks
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THE PICK-UP ARTIST
Agriculture Canada | Jobs lost, facilities to close BY BRIAN CROSS SASKATOON NEWSROOM
SEE FARM GROUPS, PAGE 2
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A driver stopped to pick up something that fell off the back of his truck along highway 14 east of Biggar, Sask., May 15. |
WILLIAM DEKAY PHOTO
BSE | 10 YEARS LATER
BSE ripple effects reverberate u|xhHEEJBy00001pzYv#:, Special Report | ‘A lot of people paid a high, high price,’ with BSE discovery BY BARB GLEN LETHBRIDGE BUREAU
A laboratory, a microscope, a scientist and a slice of bovine brain that would change the world. That’s how the BSE crisis began May 20, 2003. Dr. Stefanie Czub of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency confirmed Canada’s first homegrown case of the cattle disease at midnight in Winnipeg’s National Centre for Foreign Animal Disease. She knew what it would mean, having seen its effects first hand in Germany. “The message from Ottawa was, to me for reassurance, ‘you are not alone,’ ”she said. “But when I was sitting there behind my microscope and making the call, I felt pretty lonely because I immediately realized what this would have, the impact on the farmer. I very vividly remembered what the impact of this first case was (in
Dr. Stefanie Czub immediately realized the implications of confirming a BSE diagnosis in May 2003. | FILE PHOTO Europe), and sure enough, the same was true for Canada, too.” Within days, 30 countries closed their borders to Canadian cattle and beef, as well as other livestock and meat.
Ten years later, the cattle industry has yet to fully recover. Looking back, Czub said the greatest general misconception about the confirmed Canadian case at the time was that international borders would reopen after only a short delay. Instead, it has taken years, with some countries still closed to live animals and meat from older ones. Scattered along the past decade are failed cattle operations, fewer feedlots, scrapped processing plants and an estimated $9 billion in industry losses. The BSE crisis was the impetus for herd traceability, forced the removal of specified risk materials from every carcass and spawned country-of-origin labelling in the United States, which plagues the industry to this day. In the past 10 years, Canada has detected 18 cases of BSE in cattle. A 19th case was found in an Alberta-born cow that had moved to Washington. SEE BSE EFFECTS, PAGE 2
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Farm organizations expressed surprise and disappointment last week at recently announced job cuts, programming changes and facility closures that will affect close to 700 Agriculture Canada employees. In Alberta, Wild Rose Agricultural Producers president Lynn Jacobson called the changes at Agriculture Canada disappointing and shortsighted, suggesting that reduced spending on federal research programs contradicts what Ottawa has been saying about the importance of research and innovation. “We’re disappointed that the government is making these types of cuts,” Jacobson said. “We thought, with the way … the government had set things up in Growing Forward 2 and the references that were made to innovation and investments in research, that we weren’t going to be touched on that end of things, but what Ottawa is saying and what they are practicing are two different things.” In Manitoba, James Battershill, general manager of Keystone Agricultural Producers, said the announcement from Ottawa came as a surprise to the province and the research community in Brandon, which will see work related to beef grazing systems transferred to Lacombe, Alta. Unconfirmed reports suggest that at least eight researchers and their families based in Brandon will be faced with a decision to relocate to Alberta or remain in Manitoba and seek other employment. “We know that the federal government has certain fiscal responsibilities that they have to deal with and these cuts are obviously a part of that,” Battershill said. “The fact that this came as a big surprise to a lot of people is a little bit of a concern.… We definitely would have liked to have seen more consultation … so if there are negative impacts … or if there are possible ways that we can adapt to it in the near term, the more warning we get the better.” Battershill said the decision to move beef research programs from Brandon to Lacombe overlooks the fact that unique growing conditions and research needs exist in different parts of the country.