The County of Barrhead has declared a municipal agricultural disaster.
Following agriculture service board and county administrative recommendations, council voted at their Nov. 23 meeting to make the declaration due to the excessive amounts of moisture in the area.
“The next step is sending a letter to our provincial and federal representatives, MLA Glenn van Dijken and Conservative MP Arnold Viersen, which will describe the situation and encourages them to find a way to assist the producers during this time,” County manager Mark Oberg said.
“I think it is important for everyone to realize that this is impacting all of us, not just the grain producers,” reeve Doug Drozd said.
Deputy reeve Bill Lee agreed.
“Cattle have been brought in because we haven’t been able to do any swath-grazing and they’ve wrecked our yards as a result. I spent a lot of time trying to shave off the mud and make my own property manageable, filling in holes and the like, but I’ll tell you there are ruts out there that are deep enough to lose a wagon of bales in.”
“We tend to think of the canola farmers and other cereal crops first but there is also an impact being felt by livestock producers,” Drozd said.
“We have hay that still needs to be swathed, bales that are likely frozen to the ground and are, or will be, rotted soon.”
Coun. Darrell Troock and Marvin Schatz agreed.
“I know in my area the fields have been cleaned up but there is still a lot of product out there,” Troock said.
On Nov. 22, the provincial government declared a state of agricultural disaster.
Issuing this type of declaration means that the Agriculture Financial Services Corporation (AFSC) can now access funds to compensate producers for their losses earlier.
A declaration like this brings awareness to the problem, Schatz said.
“I don’t think it is going to do anything for us financially, but it does paint an accurate picture of the conditions we all face.”
“Everyone knows that farmers have crop insurance but the best you can get is eighty per cent coverage,” Lee said. “That means that if you owned five homes and one caught fire, if you have a policy like we do for agricultural purposes, the house you lost doesn’t count because you still have 80 per cent of your homes intact.”
He said the 20 per cent remaining in the fields is what puts groceries on the table.
The county joins Lac Ste. Anne, Brazeau, Leduc, Thorhild, Yellowhead and Parkland counties as the number of municipalities affected continues to grow.
