Alberta's Minister of Agriculture and Forestry says, it's been a good average year for agriculture in the Province.

Oneil Carlier says, we continue to have good years, but that doesn't mean 2017 didn't have it's challenges.

"You know, dry conditions in the South, we had finishing up the bovine tuberculosis problem that we had in the Southeast, work is being done on that, and then of course the wildfires also in the South."

Some other challenges around agriculture this year have been with marketing, Carlier says.

"We're not quite sure yet where NAFTA is headed. There was some discouraging news coming out of India looking at 50 per cent tariffs on some of our pulse products, as well as a fumigation issue that still lingers with India, so there's challenges there as well, but I'm a pretty optimistic person by nature. I think overall, agriculture is still a good business."

On a more positive note, a couple months ago, Carlier had to opportunity to go on a trade mission to the E.U. to represent Alberta agriculture.

"With the CETA (Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement) provisional agreements going through, it's a great opportunity for a lot of our producers, a lot of our products to be marketed even more in Europe. So, I think there's a look of good news on the horizon."

When reflecting on 2017, Carlier says, he's proud of all the work put into the Canadian Agricultural Partnership.

The new program will be replacing Growing Forward 2, which he says, was a $400 million success.

"That's the amount of money that was ejected into agriculture into being able to upgrade food processing plants for example, and of course a whole suite of business risk management tools, and crop insurance a big part there as well. So, it has been a great program."

The Canadian Agricultural Partnership is a $3 billion, five year investment by Federal, Provincial, and Territorial governments to strengthen the agriculture and agri-food sector.

Carlier says, the new program will be replacing Growing Forward 2 in April of next year.

He says, agriculture is the second largest industry in the Province, and will continue to be a viable, important, and sustainable industry for the entire Province.

 

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