The Reid family harvest their wheat crop near Cremona, Alta., Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2023. Canada is the world's sixth-largest producer and one of the largest exporters of wheat, annually producing an average of over 25 million tonnes and exporting around 15 million tonnes.
But extreme weather - from drought to wildfires to “heat domes” to flash floods - has plagued farmers from coast to coast in recent years. Above and beyond crop insurance, Canada also has a federal-provincial-territorial disaster relief framework that can be triggered when farmers encounter “extraordinary costs,” such as the extra feed costs ranchers in Western Canada have had to pay in recent years as drought dries up their pasture lands.
While crop insurance will always be necessary, said Shannon Sereda, director of government relations for the industry group Alberta Grains, governments can mitigate against the financial toll of extreme weather by stepping up investment in agricultural research. “With access to innovation, there's a lot of things that we can do as producers that will help keep our risk at a controllable level,” Oke said.
“Because in Western countries, when these happen, governments are intervening a lot - meaning they subsidize and cover the losses. But in the long run, that's just not sustainable for government spending. It costs a lot of money.