Growers get $5M in new support
The applause was loud, and immediate, when $5 million more in provincial government help for Okanagan orchardists was announced Friday in Kelowna.
“The Tree Fruit Competitiveness Fund is new support for this industry,” Agriculture Minister Lana Popham told a ballroom packed with delegates to the BC Fruit Growers’ Association annual conference at the Coast Capri Hotel.
“This fund will help family-run orchards and the sector as a whole with advancements that make B.C. tree fruit more competitive in the marketplace. It’s open to growers, producers and processors for research, marketing and infrastructure, and will help with the oversubscription of the replant program.”
The money, to be distributed by the association over the next three to four years, is in addition to the existing replant program that helps growers switch over to highdensity and high-value popular apple varieties, such as Ambrosia and Honeycrisp, and late-harvest cherries.
It is also in addition to the Agri Stabilization Fund, which is helping orchard is ts cover 2017 losses due to low apple prices.
“With a little help, orchardists can seize opportunities for success,” said the agriculture minister.
“It’s about modernizing a sector critically important to this province.”
The $5 million can be spent on everything from upgrading packing houses to domestic and international marketing of B.C. apples, cherries, pears, peaches, plums, apricots and nectarines, and on research into better practices and subsidizing replanting.
The Okanagan tree fruit industry has about 800 orchardists. They farm 6,474 hectares and produce 129,000 tonnes of fruit worth more than $116 million.
As a whole, the industry is a $776-million-a-year economic engine.
Popham, the MLA for Saanich South and a former grape grower with the first certified-organic vineyard on Vancouver Island, also updated the crowd on a handful of other ministry initiatives.
She is spearheading a review of the Agricultural Land Reserve with an eye to making the farming sector in B.C. “stronger, forever.” The independent committee is due to report back at the end of the summer, and will consider best practices and cannabis grown on ALR land.
The Grow BC, Buy BC and Feed BC programs are all full-steam ahead.
And the government is considering co-operative and leasing programs to get farmers onto land in a time when property costs are exorbitant.
Popham also recognized outgoing BC Fruit Growers’ Association president Fred Steele as a visionary who fought for a revitalized industry.
Steele isn’t just finishing up as association president — he’s retiring from growing apples, too.
A new president will be elected by convention end.
Some of the resolutions passed at the conference include lobbying for more federal government support, asking to cull problem deer, bears and coyotes, and bringing in more foreign labour.