“Farmland values are still increasing but at a slower pace,” Gervais said during his online interview.That’s true at the national level when you average out all the different provinces.If you think of Ontario and Quebec, we have four years of consecutive increases slowing down, while in Saskatchewan for example, the third consecutive year of rate of growth coming down, so really I think farmland values are cooling off.
FCC’s latest Farmland Values Report shows farmland values increased by an average of 7.9 percent in 2016, compared to 10.1 percent in 2015 and 14.3 per cent in 2014.
“I’m calling this a slowdown because we’ve had 10 amazing years of growth when it comes to farm income,” Gervais added. ”In less than 10 years actually we’ve more than doubled crop receipts and that’s especially true in the prairies.”
FCC Chief Agricultural Economist J.P. Gervais says what stands out is that, for the third consecutive year, growth has slowed down.