Nobody likes surprises. Just coming off the last surprise with legislation around greenwashing, the newest is a cash-grab from the regulator. The Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) is now proposing to increase the fees it collects from organizations that want to register pesticides by a whopping 256%. Those of us in business, which includes every single farmer in Canada, knows what happens when costs go up, they get passed along and land in our lap.
The PMRA’s mandatory fees are accompanied by highly inefficient processes and come with no serious effort to find internal efficiencies. In 2021 the PMRA’s Transformation initiative received $42 million over three years which they have blown through. Not only do they have next to nothing to show for it, almost all close observers of PMRA say that things have gotten worse. This was money that should have gone to reducing PMRA’s pesticide review backlog to put innovation in the hands of farmers more quickly.
As a producer group wanting to elevate the ag industry both through traditional and non-traditional crops, we want to make sure we have options within our cropping mix. The talk about new and diverse field crops out West or otherwise gives us optimism, but it is being sullied by the punitive nature of the PMRA increase.
The increase will further affect fledgling companies bringing new technologies to market, degrade our already strained profitability, and result in companies simply registering fewer products. That means fewer tools and reduced overall flexibility, which will make us less competitive against our American counterparts. If the PMRA dissuades companies from ensuring we have the right tools to farm sustainably, we simply won’t be able to, and that is an unacceptable outcome for us.
All of this has been happening while much of agriculture’s attention has been understandably focused on urgent, larger problems. China’s dumping of canola investigation, strikes on both coasts and at both railways and potential U.S. tariffs to mention a few, the PMRA cost increases haven’t received the attention they normally would. The lack of transparency at PMRA is concerning, and there’s a growing sense that the agency is becoming a ‘black box’ that makes decisions without consulting the main users of pesticides – farmers.
All farmers should be concerned and demand that the government scrutinize processes and expenses to find efficiencies. We want to see detailed accounting of what a proposed future state for PMRA does to Canadian farmers’ competitiveness and critical ability to control pests of all nature before blindly calling for 256% fee increases.
The Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association will once again be on the front lines for the farmers that rely on crop protection products to supply safe and nutritious food. We call on Ministers to put a stop to the callous disregard some PMRA executives seem to have for the wellbeing of Canadian farmers.
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