Ontario, Ottawa to share cost of helping drought stricken farmers get winter hay

OTTAWA – Farmers hit by a major summer drought in Ontario and Quebec say they are growing frustrated by delays in getting federal aid to ship desperately needed hay from Western Canada.

Government sources say federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz approved a cost-sharing plan with the Ontario government last week to help pay for the shipments of winter hay.

The plan would see Ottawa pay 60 per cent of the shipment costs, with Ontario paying the rest, up to a maximum of $3 million.

The federal portion of the funding would come from the government’s Growing Forward initiative.

But a spokeswoman for Ritz says no decisions have been made and the government continues to assess what’s needed.

Ontario’s agriculture minister Ted McMeekin, meanwhile, could announce provincial funding as early as this weekend.

“It’s very frustrating,” says Dave Campbell, the president of the Lanark Federation of Agriculture, who is helping to organize an event Saturday to raise private donations for the shipments.

“I know the provincial government that everybody is criticizing has been on side all along,” said Campbell. “Even Conservative farmers … are concerned.”

Farmers in Ontario and western Quebec were left short of hay to feed their livestock when a severe drought hit the area over the summer.

“Hay East 2012” is a sequel of sorts to the “Hay West” assistance program that saw eastern farmers send more than 100,000 tonnes of hay to farmers in Western Canada when that region faced a similar drought in 2002.

Some farmers in eastern Ontario have already received more than 200 bales of donated hay from Western Canada through deliveries organized by the Mennonite Disaster Service. While grateful, they say they need a whole lot more.

Hay East 2012 organizers say they’ve received 235 applications from farmers who are hoping to see 70,000 large hay bales delivered so their livestock can survive the winter.

The federal government has also been speaking with Quebec’s agriculture ministry about that province’s hay shortfall.

But sources say the new Quebec agriculture minister wants money from Agricovery, a last-resort federal program designed to provide disaster assistance.