September 29, 2006

Age verification programme irks ranchers in Canada's Northwest

Canada's Northwest beef ranchers are feeling the pinch at a time when hay prices have doubled and a new age verification programme seemed determined to draw on their already strained finances.

Ranchers say a new law, to be introduced in April 2007 requiring cattle to be age-verified, is bad news.

Cattle whose age has been verified do not get a premium, even though the technology cuts into farmers' bottomline. 

The programme requires the rancher to pay US$3 a head for tags, and other associated costs.

Ranchers who have not age-verified their cattle would not be allowed to sell them at the stockyard starting next year. 

While some are griping about the added costs, other ranchers question the integrity of the system as the tags are not totally tamper-proof and simply rely on the honesty of the farmer in question.

Ranchers said the tighter regulations has only hit farmers while tripling the profits of the country's three largest meat packers.

Northwest farmers are also hit by higher feed costs; ranchers in the region can pay twice as much for hay as those from Alberta.

With increased costs like these, it is no wonder many are scaling down their operations. Cattle farming, they say, is not a business, but rather, it has become a lifestyle.