Stewart open to opening up ownership legislation

Agriculture Minister Lyle Stewart said his ministry will consider changing legislation or regulations around farmland ownership rules in the wake of complaints about investment funds and foreign investors buying and driving up the price of farmland in Saskatchewan.

“We’ve heard some concerns from producers,” Stewart said in an interview following a media conference in Saskatoon Thursday.

The concerns stem partly from the purchase late last year of Assiniboia Farmland LLP by the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for $128 million. The acquisition of the 46,500 hectares (115,000 acres) of farmland by the CPPIB was condemned by Progressive Conservative Party Leader Rick Swenson as “wrong, both legally and morally.”

“When you make a decision like this, where you open up (farmland ownership) to a pension plan whether it’s Canadian or non-Canadian, ... you’re making a fundamental shift in the way you’ve treated this particular resource,” Swenson said, adding Canadians should be able to buy Saskatchewan farmland on condition they continue to farm the land.

However, Economy Minister Bill Boyd said the acquisition was seen by the Farm Land Security Board and the Ministry of Justice officials as consistent with the Saskatchewan Farm Security Act, which was changed in 2002 to allow Canadians to invest in Saskatchewan farmland.

Recently, Dan Patterson, a former head of the FLSB, has raised similar concerns about pensions funds, like CPPIB, being able to acquire large tracts of Saskatchewan farmland. Patterson, who served as general manager of the FLSB for 20 years under both PC and NDP governments, noted a senior official with the CPPIB suggested the fund intended to invest $2 billion to $3 billion in farmland over the next five years.

“The land would necessarily and inevitably be consolidated into large blocks operated by commercialscale corporation concerns,” Patterson said in an opinion piece in The Western Producer in early December. “The result would be the beginning of the end of local family ownership as the basis of our farm ownership structure.”

“WE’VE HEARD SOME CONCERNS FROM PRODUCERS.” LYLE STEWART

Responding to a question Dec. 4 from NDP agriculture critic Cathy Sproule, Stewart said Saskatchewan has “fairly strict regulations in comparison with other provinces,” such as B.C. and Ontario, which don’t restrict foreign ownership of farmland.

“But,” he added, “we understand that there is concern out there about potential offshore money being involved in purchases of Saskatchewan farmland and with institutional investors.”

As a result, Stewart said his ministry was “looking at possibilities of opening that (Saskatchewan Farm Security) Act.”

Stewart said the review would take place in the new year with changes to legislation or regulations, if any, presented to the fall session of the legislature for passage in the spring session in 2016.

“We’ll be talking to stakeholders,” Stewart said.

He added legislative changes made in 2002 didn’t contemplate large-scale investments in farmland by institutional investors.