Harrison must hit reset button on vital provincial trade issues
Vicki Dutton recalls the repeated message she heard as a representative of the pulse crop industry on a 2013 Asian/Middle Eastern trade mission.
“At every stop, the minister was asked about our ability to ship,” said Dutton, a Payntonarea farmer on the Saskatchewan Pulse Growers’ Board.
“When you run a business like agriculture trade, you need to get the product out of the country.”
A resurgence in oil prices
(the West Texas Intermediate price has increased six per cent since November) and wheat prices (which increased by eight per cent on Chicago Futures exchange in the past three months) combined with another harsh winter has reignited the worst railcar shortage this country has seen since 2013.
Adding to the pulse producers’ problem is former Soviet satellite countries like Kazakhstan are emerging as major players in the world pulse market industry. Improved rail transportation in that area means they can get product to market far quicker, Dutton said. She noted a conversation with an Egyptian buyer who said he can buy Kazakhstan lentils for $410 a tonne (compared with $407 a tonne for Canadian lentils). However, Kazakhstan lentils can now be delivered to Turkey in two weeks compared with a minimum 90 days it takes to get Canadian lentils.
“The biggest change is the world has moved to other producers,” Dutton said.
Alas, it is not the only problem. Saskatchewan Agriculture Minister Lyle Stewart said this week he hopes Prime Minister Justin Trudeau can resolve during his trade mission that starts Saturday a long-standing dispute with India that’s producing a 40to 50-per-cent tariff on Canadian pulse crops.
By no small coincidence, the threat to the $1-billion pulse crop trade between Canada and India comes at a time when India’s own pulse production is on the rise.
For Dutton, these disruptions in trade are a reminder that neither producers nor government can ever rest on their laurels.
“In all fairness, everything was going so well,” she said. “When things are going so easily, do you ever worry about the future?
“I don’t know if we lost sight of the future, but I think farmers are every bit as guilty as government.”
The need to keep on top of such matters is one reason why new Premier Scott Moe campaigned on a leadership promise of creating a Ministry of Export and Trade Development that he gave to former economy minister Jeremy Harrison.
Saskatchewan’s former economy ministry and past minister Bill Boyd seemed bogged down for the past two years on the Global Transportation Hub controversy over land purchases now under RCMP investigation.
Saskatchewan can ill afford to ever let its guard down in trade. Yet, somehow, Alberta licence plates at construction job sites and stocking of local craft beer on Alberta liquor shelves have seemed a greater priority than ensuring Regina’s Evraz can manufacture pipe in the face of B.C. NDP government’s resistance to the Trans Mountain pipeline or U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs on steel.
Clearly, now is time to hit the reset button, which is where Harrison comes in.
While it is true Harrison was as caught up in the GTH mess as much as anyone in former premier Brad Wall’s regime, his brief entry into the Saskatchewan Party race shows he’s done his penance.
At the very least, as a former economy minister, Conservative MP and someone who seems — unlike Boyd — to understand the importance of paying attention to detail, Harrison seems as wellsuited to the near-impossible task as anyone.
“A lot of this is federal policy,” Harrison acknowledged.
However, there is much work to be done of preparing provincial responses to trade actions or fixing issues of rail crossings and sidings to ensure the flow of product here.
Glamorous trade trips may be few and far between. That said, there will also be wins like Thursday’s announcement that Saskatchewan-based Protein Innovations Canada won federal supercluster funding.
Hopefully, Harrison can get the Saskatchewan government back on track when it comes to addressing trade issues.