Sask caps grazing lease rate hikes

By Medicine Hat News on March 11, 2025.

@MedicineHatNews

The Saskatchewan government says it will limit increases in grazing rates at 20 per cent and use longer-term averages of cattle prices to avoid price shocks in how rates on Crown land are formulated.

That is in response to cattle producers argument that price spikes in cattle markets last fall would skew the formula used to determine rates much.

Earlier this year, Alberta instituted changes to how capital improvement offsets are factored in order to dampen the effect of record beef prices.

Saskatchewan will use the average of fall cattle prices over the previous five years to determine increases, rather than just the previous year.

Saskatchewan Agriculture Minister Daryl Harrison said the new formula “provides a fair and transparent pricing structure for producers and a fair return for a public asset back to Saskatchewan taxpayers.”

It comes after consultations with producer groups.

“We have been requesting changes to the formula for a while and pleased where the province has landed,” said Keith Day, the past chair of the Saskatchewan Cattle Association. “The 20 per cent ceiling on fee increase will help producers and community pastures better plan for any possible changes to the rates.”

No potato wart spread: survey

More than 2,200 field survey samples from across Canada show no signs of potato wart is has spread, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency announced on March 4.

The stubborn soil-borne fungus reduces yield and quality of tubers. It has been previously detected in Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland.

Last year samples from British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia found no new positive locations.

CFIA president Paul MacKinnon and Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAuley said the survey and its results are key to maintaining productivity in Canada’s fifth largest crop and maintaining confidence of trading partners.

Canadian potato growers recored a record crop in 2024 of 127 million tonnes, up 1.2 per cent from the previous year, including just more than 30 million tonnes from Alberta farms.

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