Ag ministers meeting hears from CFA president

Canada’s agriculture ministers met this week in Winnipeg after postponing their usual July in-person meeting due to wildfires.

They heard from Canadian Federation of Agriculture president Keith Currie that they should focus on regulatory modernization and economic development.

He said prime minister Mark Carney ‘s focus on NATO spending provides agriculture with an opportunity to capitalize on infrastructure spending  such as ports, rail and energy pipelines.

Currie said the suite of business risk management programs needs an overhaul.

That could include improvements to crop insurance or a shift to private insurance.

Ministers were scheduled to discuss BRM, international trade and market access, and internal trade.

Other topics on the agenda included animal disease preparedness, crop protection and pesticides, labour and the temporary foreign worker program.