New amendments to air and rail transportation have come through the government process and will soon become law.
Bill C-49, amendments to the Canada Transportation Act and other Acts, has been in discussion for several years as many commodity sectors in western Canada have been impacted by issues with getting commodities to port.
Rail is the only option for prairie grain farmers, says Ian Boxall with the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan (APAS), but Boxall was hard-pressed in coming up with an industry that has not been impacted.
In terms of the cost of moving agricultural commodities, APAS president Todd Lewis noted earlier in the year that farmers have previously paid $40 million in demurrage fees for the 2013-2014 grain backlog.
Rail companies have taken advantage of the fact that they have a captive market, says Boxall.
“We can’t truck it to port. It just isn’t feasibly possible and I feel sometimes that we’ve been taken advantage of (by rail companies).”
Companies are moving grain when they want to move it, instead of when farmers need them to move it and every four years seems to spell problems between shippers and rail companies.
Farmers cannot afford that, he says.
A 22,000 rail car back log takes time to fix, says Boxall, but if it can be cleared by the end of August, that would be ideal for the 2018 harvest.
Especially with the CN Rail workers not going on strike, Boxall says there is an opportunity for a fresh start with the passing of C-49.
Reciprocal penalties, level of service agreements, and planning requirements will all be beneficial to grain farmers as it will hold the rail companies to account for how they are going to get grain to port.
Another important piece is amendments that will make it easier for the Canadian Transportation Agency to investigate complaints without formal complaints being filled by the shippers.
“Shippers are often lenient filing a complaint because they’re worried about the service they will get because of the repercussions of that.”
If these amendments do not hold rail companies to account, Boxall says it is back to lobbying the government to provide more support for farmers.
That is something that Cam Goff with the National Farmers Union (NFU) is not happy about since the government could have been doing a better job at speaking up for farmers to begin with.
With farmers not being considered shippers, they do not have the same standing as others at the table, says Goff. Not much has changed with new legislation, and farmers are almost like beggars having to join the conversation through government lobbying.
“Yes, they will listen to us but they’re under no obligation to take us seriously and they don’t seem to be.”
Goff sees the passing of the bill as more a feather in the cap of the grain companies with little being done at the ground level for farmers. While there are amendments to hold railway companies to account, farmers may only receive small benefits from that.
One thing that NFU lobbied for that could save farmers hundreds of millions a year was a costing review on the maximum revenue entitlement.
Studies have been done over the years that show that rail companies are over charging for moving commodities, says Goff, and the government needs to look into that.
“Not only would farmers know what it costs to ship grain but it would also give every other shipper a good idea of what their costs are.”
The majority of western Canadian agricultural organizations believe this to be a good idea, says Goff, and they will continue to lobby the government to have it done.
