Manitoba Beef Producer representatives encourage agricultural Crown land leaseholders to weigh in on a provincial consultation
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Manitoba Beef Producer (MBP) reps are calling on leaseholders of agricultural Crown land in the province to participate in the government’s consultations about this land.
The Government of Manitoba recently announced an online consultation process surrounding a proposed amendment to the modernization of the Agricultural Crown Lands (ACL) Leasing Program.
“The province needs to receive feedback from the different farm organization such as Manitoba Beef Producers, but it also needs to hear from individual producers who are directly impacted by this,” said Carson Callum, the general manager of MBP.
The modernization of ACL started three years ago, but industry leaders and producers raised some concerns in October 2019 when government officials updated regulations.
“Manitoba Beef Producers and our members were quite concerned with the lack of a first right of renewal,” Callum told Farms.com. “The benefit of a first right of renewal is, as long as you're meeting the terms and conditions of your lease, maintaining the land to the best of your ability, grazing livestock there and using it for its correct purpose, you would have the ability to renew it.”
MBP reps advocated to have the first right of renewal added to the program and it’s now a proposed amendment. Producers can provide comments on this amendment, and other areas of the program, through the online consultation until Nov. 16, said Callum.
If producers have “concerns with certain aspects of the amendment, they need to state them. If concerns aren’t stated, then government officials won't know what they may be missing,” he said.
MBP reps will continue to advocate for producers, said Callum.
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