Winter of wary wranglers

By Wendy Beswick

ALEXANDRIA — The majority of the beef animals have been captured under the new Ontario Business Risk Management Program (BRMP), according to Dave Stewart, executive director of Ontario Cattlemen’s Association (OCA).

Yet, the uptake amongst smaller cow/calf producers has been mixed, according to many Eastern Ontario OCA advisory councilors.

"We’ve had excellent participation," said Reg Campbell of Ottawa Cattlemen’s Association. "But of course there are only half a dozen of us left."

"There hasn’t been a lot of uptake," said Moe Street, advisory councilor for Lennox-Addington. "It’s been very disappointing to me."

"The only thing I can tell you is the number of applications we received," said Stephanie Charest, Agricorp communications specialist. "That does not necessarily represent the number of producers because each application could represent a partnership of two, three, or four producers. We have about 4,100 applications for livestock."

There are almost 22,000 livestock producers in Ontario with beef producers making up the vast majority at 16,000. The remainder is divided up with approximately 2,000 pork producers, 3,500 sheep producers, and 450 veal producers. These figures would confirm what many beef producers long suspected. There has been little interest in the program by smaller beef producers.

"I would say that most of the large producers have signed up," stated Stewart in a telephone interview. "But I don’t have any split between large and small producers."

"I would go back to the old 80-20 rule," said Charlie Sytsma of Athens. "Twenty per cent of whatever always owns 80 per cent of anything; no matter how you do stuff. That is the case for beef with the bigger feedlots owning the majority of cattle."

While there are as many theories for the apathy as there are producers asked, it is up to local associations to help smaller producers get on board, according to Glengarry Cattlemen’s Association president, Ian Howes.

"I think one of the most important things we should do for Glengarry cattlemen is to help local producers with risk management," he said. "I think that the uptake in the program is about 25 per cent. I think one of the main problems is that people are happy with the price they are getting at the sale barn but forget about the last 10 years. It’s totally the wrong attitude. The first thing the government is going to say is that they gave us a chance to better our industry, and they would be right."

Renfrew’s Gerald Rollins confirms Mr. Howes’ opinion that good participation in the BRMP needs a strong local involvement.

"I’d say a significant number did (apply forthe BRMP) because we had a really good turnout for our meeting, the one I held here myself" said Rollins. "We had 70 people and I would say that the majority of them did participate."

Yet, problems with past programs combined with the unknown quantities of this program, such as how much the premium will be and what the payout is, have compounded the natural reluctance of smaller producers to get on board without strong local encouragement.

"From the first time around to the second and third time around, they keep changing the story." said Shawn Smaglinski, advisory councilor for Renfrew, who participated in the BRMP development discussions with OCA. "It just does not give you a warm and fuzzy feeling. To me, if you are going to come out with it and advertise it, you’d better have your facts straight."

Yet, for all its flaws, most advisory councilors would state that the BRMP designed by the OCA in collaboration with OMAFRA, lobbied by the Ontario Agricultural Sustainability Coalition, and funded by the Ontario provincial government, is the best game in town.

"The producers had every opportunity," said Street. "What the problem with smaller producers is that they think that anything they join, the government knows and they don’t want to expose themselves. But anything the government wants to find out, they will. There’s going to be another BSE-type crisis and these guys aren’t going to be prepared."

"It’s sad to say, but maybe this program is a little bit late coming," said Kim Sytsma, of Athens. "Maybe if we had had this program a couple of years ago there would be more cattle in the countryside."