November 2004
Confusion and angst dog CAIS and BSE set-aside programs
To their consternation, producers are finding that holding over cattle and feed can sharply reduce payouts under the Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization (CAIS) program. They are also worried about slow paymentsby DON STONEMAN
Newtonville cow-calf operator Robert Bouley has had two heart attacks and may be on his way to a third one after he got an explanation for his 2003 Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization (CAIS) payout.Bouley and his wife Sue got considerably less than they expected from CAIS because they held over cattle and hay to feed them. They feel that their bottom line would have been better if they had sold cattle last year at reduced prices because of BSE. So, in spite of announced incentives from the federal and provincial governments, they plan to market their calves this fall.
The reason? They expect that their CAIS payout will be reduced by more than they would get for holding their cattle back from market.
The Bouleys have experience with farm assistance programs after a disastrous 2002 calf crop. Their bull didn't produce in the previous summer's hot weather, Robert Bouley says tersely.
They established their reference margin of $56,317 (the average of five previous years incomes with the high and low years removed). After deducting premiums of $14,647, their production margin was $44,000. Because they had farm income of only $10,000, they figured they should be able to access CAIS funds to as much as $35,000.
Imagine their surprise when they found that their accessible CAIS funds were lower than they expected because their inventories of feed and cattle had increased. When the calendar year 2003 started, the Bouleys had an inventory of 225 tonnes of hay. At the end of the year, they had an extra 74 tonnes of hay in storage. "They valued those extra tonnes at $99 a tonne and deducted the proceeds from my 2003 payout," Bouley says.
As well as the hay, the Bouleys kept three cows, 17 calves and 13 open heifers into the next fiscal year. Bouley figures their market value in light of the BSE crisis is about $12,000. He wishes he had sold them in 2003. "If I would have sold them, I would have realized the cash in 2003 and it wouldn't have impacted my CAIS program. Because I kept them, the CAIS program deducted $14,400 from my payout."
So what does this have to say about the CAIS program? "The biggest and most important thing they have done is to put a value on any cattle above the basic herd of 2002, and deducted that value from the proceeds of the CAIS program." It's too late to change what has happened in 2003, Bouley says. But if Ontario beef farmers hold back cattle into 2004, the ministry of agriculture will put a value on the hay and cattle and deduct it from a 2004 CAIS payout.
"I wouldn't have had to feed them." And he says he would have incurred some trucking and marketing expenses that would have let him increase his CAIS payout.
Beef feedlot operator John Gillespie, chair of the Agricultural Commodity Council, which represents non-supply-managed commodities, cautions that farmers shouldn't be making snap decisions on holding back cattle until they get more information on the proposed BSE set aside programs this fall.
Hay inventory is a consideration for small cow-calf operators, Gillespie says, particularly in Western Canada where hay cut in a good rain year may be fed over two or three winters. CAIS treats hay as a cash crop that will eventually be sold, but for farmers who feed it to their livestock "it doesn't increase the value of the animals (it is fed to). It just gets them through the winter."
Grain is different because it adds value to an animal. Gillespie says the cattle feeding business is about "taking $10,000 worth of grain and turning it into $15,000 worth of beef."
At the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, farm policy advisor Jason Bent describes Bouley's financial situation as "an unrealized loss" and says the CAIS program was not designed to cover that. The federal government has hired IBM Consulting (formerly Price Waterhouse) to review how inventory is valued for the CAIS program. Perhaps a new solution will be more equitable, Bent says.
The BSE set aside program for cattle is another issue, Bent says. It seems that the provincial government intends to include the latest BSE set-aside program payment in CAIS's production margin for the claim year but will not include those payments in the production margin in future reference years. The end result is that producers' support will be lowered in future years. The Ontario Cattlemen's Association is asking that BSE payments be included in both the reference period and claim year's production margins in order to make the payments more consistent and equitable.
Otherwise, Bent, says, it seems that producers must incur additional production costs to get the set-aside program payments, but the additional costs will reduce their future CAIS program support levels and that doesn't seem to be fair.
Gillespie says the slow payment from the CAIS program is also a concern. As of Oct. 3, 10,000 forms had been processed out of 30,000 received. "They've got a long way to go," Gillespie says. Still, he says, "a producer would be very, very foolish not to be enrolled in CAIS. Hopefully the calves will be worth more next year."
He adds that "the (Ontario agriculture ministry) people are getting a pretty hard shell" because of constant criticism of farm programs that are supposed to help producers.
As soon as a program is announced, "somebody says it's no good. It's not good farm lobbying," he asserts. BF
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An open mind on provincial concerns about cost-sharing makes this ag minister different
His predecessors stuck rigidly to the 60:40 federal-provincial split on farm support programs. But Andy Mitchell, the current minister, is showing he is at least willing to listen to the provinces' calls for a more equitable sharing of the burdenby BARRY WILSON
Little may come of it, but the agreement by federal agriculture minister Andy Mitchell finally to take seriously provincial complaints about the affordability of cost-shared national farm programs is an important milestone on the path to designing sustainable farm supports.And you may be excused if this development hasn't appeared on your radar screen.
Governments have done little to publicize it, but when they met in Prince Edward Island in September, federal and provincial agriculture ministers agreed to meet in the autumn to talk about whether the existing cost-sharing formula is fair and reasonable.
The actual meeting may have happened by the time this column hits your kitchen table. The resolution of the issue, if it ever happens, is months away. The issue is as simple as two plus two and as complicated as Canada's byzantine federal-provincial system, in which agriculture is a shared jurisdiction.
The simple side of the equation is that since the early 1990s, Ottawa has expected the provinces to pay 40 cents for every 60 cents the federal government pays for most farm support programs. That number was chosen arbitrarily in the early days of the Liberal government of the 1990s in an attempt to limit federal spending and force provinces to recognize their joint responsibility.
The complexity is this. In provinces that are heavily dependent on agriculture -- Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Prince Edward Island being the main examples but most provinces have their own tale to tell -- it is a tough cost-share to afford. When the sector is hurting and needs greater help, provincial revenues are down because one of their major industries is suffering. It is more difficult for those governments to find their 40 percent and, if they cannot, farmers in other provinces end up receiving more generous support.
It is a political and fiscal catch-22 -- farmers are in trouble and they need more support from their provincial government, but the government has less to offer because the farm economy is hurting and revenues are down.
A succession of Liberal agriculture ministers -- Ralph Goodale who made 60/40 the first of the Ten Commandments handed down from Mount Chrétien, Lyle Vanclief and Bob Speller -- has been hostile to the provincial argument that this is a structurally unsustainable formula. At best, they were willing to consider allowing hard-pressed provinces to pay less in the early years of a program if they agreed to pay more later. Mitchell is the first to agree to consider the core of the complaint.
There is a precedent. More than three decades ago, Ottawa listened to the complaints of provinces about their inability to keep pace with national spending levels and created an equalization program to try to ensure Canadian citizens in all provinces had access to roughly the same level of public services.
Current provincial agriculture ministers are asking for a type of equalization formula for agriculture that will make sure farmers in all provinces have access to the same level of support, no matter what their province's ability to pay.
Mitchell says he is willing to discuss "affordability," even though Goodale, now finance minister, remains committed to 60/40 come hell, high water or provincial poverty.
It surely is reasonable to examine provincial claims of fiscal incapacity. In federal-provincial relations, Mitchell won some early brownie points by appearing open-minded. BF
Barry Wilson is a member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery specializing in agriculture.
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Brazil: Are there problems on the horizon?
Bad roads, strikes, a leaky GMO-free status and environmental protests are just a few of the problems Brazilian agriculture is facing. Even so, with low labour costs and a currency advantage, it remains a formidable competitorby BOB THOMAS
Last February, it cost me $5 to drive 25 kilometres on Brazil's federal highway 242 between Lencois and Itaberaba in Bahia state, and it's not even a toll road!Nor was the money spent on speeding fines, for I was only travelling at 25 km/hr, the maximum speed possible on this pothole-strewn stretch of the 900-kilometre route between Barreiras, the hub of Cerrado soybean farming, and Salvador, the sea port through which much of the crop is exported. My expenditure was for tips to unemployed workers and small children who take shovelfuls of dirt from the roadsides to fill in the huge potholes in the pavement, and then hold out their hands for gratuities from passing vehicles. The state and local roads are even worse, but no one complains. It's just another frustration in getting crops to market.
On another occasion, I was between groups of farmers for my annual ag tours to Brazil and driving from Curitiba to Sao Paulo when I missed (by a couple of days) the 120-kolometre lineup of trucks to be unloaded at Paranagua port on the coast of Parana state. The cause was a union strike in a country where labour unrest is becoming increasingly common as President Lula Da Silva walks a tightrope between holding down government spending, retaining inflation below 12 per cent and increased agitation for social reforms.
Meanwhile, the environmentalists are flexing their muscle. In May 2004, a Greenpeace protest held up the topping off of an ocean-bound vessel with 10,000 tonnes of conventional soybeans at the same port. The reason: the vessel contained a partly filled cargo of GMO soys which it had loaded in Argentina. Parana state is officially GMO free but in reality it is almost GMO free.
In 1995, the government enacted a biosafety law setting up the National Technical Commission on Biosafety (CTNbio) to oversee GMOs in Brazil. In February 1997, CTNbio gave Monsanto approval to field-test Roundup Ready soys and, in 1998, five genetically modified soybean varieties were approved for commercial release. This prompted Brazil's consumer protection organization, IDEC, to file a lawsuit claiming insufficient environmental testing had been done. The feds issued a restraining order banning GMO's in Brazil and the legal wrangling continues today.
Meanwhile, down on the farm, RR soybean seed was being smuggled into southern Brazil from nearby Paraguay and Argentina. Clandestine GMO soys in the pipeline reached such proportions that Brazil was losing credibility as a non-GMO marketer of soybeans.
So, in late 2003, Brazil allowed the planting and marketing of GMO soybeans up to and including the 2004/2005 crop. But the Parana state government protested and passed legislation which banned the planting, sale and transport of GMOs within the state until 2006.
Enter the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, the number five producer of soybeans in Brazil, whose closest export market happens to be through the port of Paranagua. In yet another lawsuit, it claimed that Parana's state law breaks the constitutional rights of freedom of movement, free competition and private property, as well as preventing their free access to the port. By way of compromise, Parana agreed in February 2004 to allow up to 0.9 per cent GMO soys to be shipped through Paranagua, with costs of testing to be absorbed by the port. This acceptance level is consistent within international standards, but will undoubtedly result in more truck delays to unload.
With 45 per cent of Brazil's soy exports going to the European Union, the final chapters of this GMO drama are no doubt still to unfold. And, while farmers appear to want the right to grow RR soys, 95 per cent of them now retain their own seed and Technical Use Agreements (TUAs) in Argentina or Brazil do not exist. Since Monsanto's market share of Brazilian soybean seed is estimated to be 20 per cent, one wonders how long this volatile situation can continue.
Although soys are the cheapest and easiest for many farmers, there is increased interest in producing corn to meet domestic demand. At the 3,200-member Coopavel co-operative in Cascavel, poultry processing of 140,000 birds daily is scheduled to double next year. This comes after an already remarkable increase of 175 per cent in the last 10 years. Forty per cent of this chicken goes to Japan and the expansion is expected to push this to 60 per cent. The United States' share of the world export poultry market has already declined from 50 to 37 per cent, while Brazil's market share has increased to 31 per cent.
Hog slaughter at the ultra-modern Coopavel facility is now 1,500 daily, an increase of 68 per cent over the same time period. And 200 cattle are slaughtered daily, an increase of 200 per cent in the past 10 years. With plant labour costing $200 Cdn per month for willing workers, and the low Brazilian currency value ($1 Cdn = 2.2 Brazil Reais), there is little doubt that Brazil will be marketing more grains through meat onto world markets, and more corn will be needed to feed these animals. Brazil's beef herd presently numbers 171 million head and 1.37 million tons of beef is exported annually.
Soybean rust caught most Brazilian farmers off guard in 2001 and 2002, when it caused yield reductions of 10 per cent to 50 per cent. It is now present in Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Bolivia as well as China, India, Japan and Africa. Extended periods of wetness with temperatures between 50 and 80 F favour development of the dreaded two strains of the Phakopsora pachyrhizi fungus.
Although EMBRAPA, the Brazilian federal department of agricultural research is pursuing resistant strains, fungicides are now the main combatant with widespread technical support coming from the chemical companies. Costs of $40 Cdn or more per hectare for two applications can be readily absorbed by farmers as long as soy prices remain high. However, if soys return to lower prices in the future, the added cost of spraying will likely cause a shift to corn for the second or winter crop (May-October) for latitudes below 25 degrees south, where winter rains are more conducive to corn.
Up to now, corn has not been a major crop for a variety of reasons. Corn prices tend to be more variable because they are internally derived and dependent on livestock demand, whereas soybean prices are based on Chicago. Plate planters have resulted in uneven stands, and farmers generally are not precise in their herbicide applications. North American varieties of corn are not suited to South American condition, although the germ plasma in being incorporated into breeding programs to improve Brazilian genetics. And, finally, the popular mindset is that soybeans are easier and less costly to grow than corn.
Many questions remain. Will continuous soybeans result in disease buildup? It hasn't yet. Will more Cerrado land be opened up and will land prices eventually increase as they have in North America? It is probably already happening. Will roads and infrastructure improve? This is also happening at a rapid rate. BF
Bob Thomas farms in Elgin County and has visited Brazil and Argentina frequently over the last 15 years.
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Pheromone trials under way to halt Swede midge
With 12 counties in Ontario and one in Quebec infected by this crop pest, researchers are using pheromene traps to help them get a handle on the best times to sprayby WENDY ADAMS
That wee pest, the Swede midge, is attacking cole crops in Ontario and Quebec, forcing local agriculture specialists to team up with colleagues from Europe and the United States to halt its invasion.The existence of the Swede midge, which is of European and Asian descent, was confirmed in 2000 in Ontario's York County. But, says Kristen Callow, provincial vegetable crops specialist with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food (OMAF), it is suspected to have been here for 10 years. Since its discovery, 12 Ontario counties (Niagara, Brant, Halton, Wellington, Toronto, York, Dufferin, Durham, Victoria, Hamilton-Wentworth, Waterloo and Simcoe) and one in Laval, Que., have been placed under quarantine by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, forbidding the movement of transplant material outside these areas.
Trials using pheromone traps began this planting season in Ontario as a collaborative effort, involving Callow, Hannah Fraser, OMAF's entomology (horticulture) program lead, and Dr. Rebecca Hallett, Department of Environmental Biology, University of Guelph. The Americans are participating in the pheromone trials in hopes of protecting an $87 million cabbage industry in New York State. "They're right across the lake from us, so they're pretty concerned," Callow says. Only since Sept. 20 were two Swede midge specimens identified in Niagara County, New York - the first confirmed findings in the U.S.
Availability of the pheromone trap came as a surprise to Callow in March. She says that, even though the Swede midge has been in Europe for more than 100 years, "this is the first time anything has come up that can trap the pest and tell us when we have flights so we can better time the spray applications."
Callow says an alert is sent via e-mail, weekly newsletter or fax to let growers know when to spray, which, in some cases, can help them cut spraying costs in half. "There is always some level of insect present," Callow explains. "If a farmer sprays and then waits five to seven days to spray again, some adults can be missed as they only live three to four days. So we're still working on trying to figure out the best times to spray."
The triangular trap contains a three-chemical blend that replicates the female mating scent to lure the males into the trap, where they encounter a sticky substance which makes escape impossible. Dr. Robert Baur of the Swiss Federal Research Institute developed the trap, whose patent is pending. "The pheromone is working excellently and we are not catching any other midges in the same family," Callow says.
There are several challenges in dealing with the Swede midge, which goes through three to five population peaks a year and can lay dormant in the soil for two years. Swede midges cause damage that is regularly attributed to other factors and only a qualified taxonomist can distinguish them from other midges in that family.
Four sites -- three in Halton-Wentworth and one in Hillsburg -- are serving as test areas that include both high and low infestation levels. Funding is courtesy of Hort Crops Ontario, a coalition of grower groups and OMAF.
While traps are in limited supply now, "we're hoping that within the next two years they will be commercially available in North America," says Callow, who is excited by the prospect of reducing growers' crop loses from as much as 90 per cent.
Trap placement is different at each of the sites. Tree lines and hedgerows seem to be good locations, since the insects cannot fly very far but can get blown into a field along the edges and work their way inwards on the crop, she says. "It's the larvae that cause the damage. The female is very good at laying her eggs on the youngest developing tissue." The larvae's saliva or spit is toxic to the plant and causes deformities because they attack the growing point. As it grows, the plant expresses damage directly related to the time and growth stage at which the plant was attacked.
"If a transplant gets attacked, then it will not produce any head at all. The grower will still plant it and it will produce leaves but nothing else. If it's a little bit later, you'll get multiple heads or just leaves and no head again." What's very tricky is that the larvae are only three millimetres long. "There are a lot of different diagnostics you can look for. Basically, where the spit first hits the plant, it forms a brown spot. Then, as the plant grows, it stretches out and forms a type of scarring."
One test site in Hamilton-Wentworth belongs to the Almas family. Don Almas initially thought his cauliflower and broccoli were victims of dud seeds. "In 2003, our chemical bill doubled," he says. Almas predicts that this year's bill will be lower because of cooler weather and considerably less pressure from other pests. "So if I wasn't spraying for Swede midge, I would hardly be doing any spraying," he adds.
"I found that some cauliflower produced a nice head, but if you flip the thing over when you trim the butt, the bottom ribs are curled." But Almas says it's still marketable, since there are no restrictions on exporting harvested produce, as the pest needs soil to complete its lifecycle. This criterion was put in place by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Almas hired a private crop scout, Jennifer Bush, who visits twice a week. "This gal finds stuff I'll never see," laughs Almas, who doesn't have enough time to check everything himself. "I figure she's worth it. It's just a cost I've got to bear. So far the chemicals have been cheaper than the damage."
Last year, some fields suffered five per cent damage. That's down to three or four per cent this year, but Almas says that, considering all the timed spraying he's doing, "that's three or four per cent too much."
Besides hiring Bush and working closely with OMAF, Almas has upgraded his sprayer. "This thing has the potential to put me out of business, so I'm trying to do all I can do to stay in business."
For more information on the Swede midge, check OMAF's Web site at www.gov.on.ca/OMAFRA/english/crops/facts/03-035.htm BF
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Argentina -- new government, new attitude, new outlook
Only three years ago, this agricultural powerhouse was reeling from a foot-and-mouth outbreak and massive economic problems. Today, several governments later, the economy seems to have turned the corner. But is the dependence on soybeans a dark cloud on the horizon?by BOB THOMAS
May 20, 2003, the day they announced BSE had been found in Canada, reminds me of March 6, 2001, in Argentina. That was the day I arrived in Buenos Aires with a group of Canadian farmers and it was announced that Argentina was no longer free of foot-and-mouth disease and the borders slammed shut to exports.Argentina had been enjoying the status of "free of foot-and-mouth without vaccination" since discontinuing its vaccination program some months beforehand. SENASA, the federal animal and food health inspection agency in Argentina, immediately undertook zone quarantines and began three vaccination programs involving 178 million doses of vaccine to protect it's $6.1 billion US industry. The last foot-and-mouth outbreak in Argentina was eradicated on Jan. 25, 2002.
Beef exports account for a smaller portion of domestic production in Argentina than they do in Canada, but the effect on Argentine farmers was devastating. Most smaller farmers were forced out of business Only larger absentee farmers not involved with beef survived. Beef prices dropped dramatically but 60 per cent of Argentina's beef is consumed domestically so the country was eventually able to eat its way out of the surplus.
For economic reasons, January 2002 was also significant in Argentina. That was when President Eduardo Duhalde announced that the Argentina peso would be unpegged from its artificial parity with the U.S. dollar. The economy went into a tailspin as bank accounts were frozen, the peso slid to 3:1 in relation to the U.S. dollar, unemployment exceeded 20 per cent and inflation rose to 40 per cent. In addition, Argentina defaulted on a $95-billion US debts.
Today, Argentina is an example of how time can heal. In the first quarter of 2004, GDP in Argentina expanded more than 10 per cent and this was the third consecutive quarter of growth. Small companies have led the optimistic news, but Ford will also produce 65,000 vehicles this year against 40,000 in 2003. Unemployment has declined to 13.9 per cent this year compared to 14.5 per cent in 2003.
Overall growth for 2004 under President Nestor Kirchner is forecast at more than 10 per cent, in sharp contrast to the 11 per cent contraction in 2002. However, the staggering debt problem remains. Argentina's offer to pay 25 cents on the dollar has been firmly rejected by the International Monetary Fund and private debtors. And, escalating oil prices threaten to undermine economic forecasts. There is also concern that Argentina is too dependent on one crop -- soybeans.
In 1952, Argentine farmers were producing 100,000 tons annually. Not only were soys easy to grow on the rich soils of Buenos Aires province, but they were ideal for double cropping with wheat.
Cattle were pushed to marginal land. By 1973, soy cultivation totalled 38,000 hectares and by 2004 this had expanded to 13 million hectares, an increase of 340 per cent. About 70 per cent of the crop is crushed, providing more than 80 per cent of the world's soybean oil exports and over one-third of the soybean meal on world markets.
It seems strange that the Argentina government should actually tax these exports to the tune of 23.5 per cent while providing little in the way of subsidies to their farmers. Argentine farmers are bitter about the lack of government support but since they haven't had government support in the past they aren't expecting it in future.
Soybeans (in various forms) now account for one quarter of Argentina's exports and, thanks to presently high prices, are a major source of foreign currency. The soybean and its derivatives now constitute one fifth of Argentina's export earnings.
With recent memories of their savings being frozen by banks, farmers are spending this new-found wealth to satisfy pent up demand. In the farming town of Pergamino, the Pergamino Maderas furniture factory has a three-month backlog of orders. John Deere tractor sales have tripled over the last year.
But is the Cinderella crop in danger of reverting to ashes in the future? Some environmentalists hope so. This semi-monoculture with limited crop rotation is being blamed for increased soil compaction and less water permeability of soils. Loss of grassland resulting from conversion to this row crop is considered to be a factor in flooding. When the Salado River, which begins in Santa Fe and Chaco provinces, overflowed last year, it resulted in 24 deaths and tens of thousands homeless. And there are fears of insect infestations leading to increased the use of endosulphan and cipermentrine, which are toxic to bees, fish and birds.
Roundup Ready soybeans have been adopted by 98 per cent of soybean farmers. There are no Technical use Agreements in Argentina and it is estimated that 60 per cent of seed sales are black market -- referred to as "bolsa blanca" because farmers sell the seed in large white bags with no labels. Monsanto had 15 per cent of the seed market, but for this reason it has withdrawn. This leaves most seed sales to Netherlands-based Nidera and Argentina's Don Mario or Relmo seed companies.
The Argentine Pampas are considered to be one of the six most agriculturally productive and organically rich soils in the world. Will it remain that way after the soybean? Considering that its population size of 37 million and its agriculture economy are similar to those of Canada, Argentina remains a fascinating country to watch. BF
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by HENRY HENGEVELD
November 2004
Another cool, wet summer ahead for Ontario in 2005?
The weather forecasters were on the mark with their predictions for last summer. Now they are pondering the possibility of another El Niño episode in the Pacific, a warm winter and cooler than normal conditions for next spring and summerby HENRY HENGEVELD
Ontario's growing season for 2004 has been a rather cool and wet one. After a near-normal winter and a somewhat warmer than normal spring (0.9°C above the long-term average), the summer months passed by with daily high temperatures persistently between the low and high 20s.The results, when averaged over the June through August period, were mean daily temperatures some 0.7°C below the long-term average and the seventh coolest summer since 1948. However, it was a comfortable one. While in most parts of Ontario the mercury seldom rose above 30°C, there were also relatively few very cool periods. Meanwhile, the lack of very hot days also meant very few severe smog episodes and relatively low levels of heat stress -- a far cry from some other recent summers.
The Great Lakes Basin received 20 per cent and 15 per cent more rain than normal during the spring and summer, respectively. The frequency of precipitation, while hampering planting and haying activities and spoiling many leisure activities during the summer, also ensured a season entirely free of drought and provided for lots of pasture grass. Homeowners found that lawns just wouldn't stop growing.
The excess water also helped to restore some of the depleted water levels in Ontario's larger lakes. For example, while the upper Great Lakes continue to show levels below the long-term average, by mid-August levels in the lower lakes (Lakes Erie and Ontario) were back to near or slightly above normal values. All said and done, not a bad summer for the Basin.
Other parts of Canada were significantly less well off. The Prairies shivered through a summer that averaged about 1.4°C colder than normal, making this the fourth coldest Prairie summer since 1948. Some areas in the region were as much as 2.5°C below normal. The southern Prairie region, having suffered through several years of severe drought, now received so much rain that many farmers were unable to get some of their acreage seeded until early July. With the added problem of low growing degree day totals during the summer, prospects for harvestable crops are no better in some areas than they were during the severe drought years!
In contrast, much of British Columbia, the Yukon and the Mackenzie regions were excessively warm and dry. Northern B.C. and the Yukon experienced their warmest summer on record (2.5°C above normal), the Pacific coastal region its second warmest (+2.3°C) and the southern B.C. mountain region it's fourth warmest. The Mackenzie district underwent its driest summer since 1948 (50 per cent of normal precipitation), and Northern B.C/Yukon its eleventh driest.
Until rains began to bring some relief in August, many areas of interior B.C. and the Yukon once again experienced large and stubborn forest fires, although somewhat further removed from major settlements this year. By early September, more than 2.8 million hectares of Canadian forests had been ravaged by fire, with over 70 per cent of this loss occurring in these western regions.
The pattern of temperature trends around the globe for the year so far is as complex as that for Canada -- very warm in some regions, cool in others. On average, temperature anomalies indicate that the trend towards warmer conditions continued during 2004. Records maintained by the American National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration indicate that the first seven months of the year were about 0.52°C above the long-term average, making the year to date the fourth warmest on record. The Northern Hemisphere was slightly warmer than the Southern Hemisphere, coming in at third warmest on record.
The U.S. climate prediction centre also indicates that early signs of another El Niño episode are beginning to appear in the central and western regions of the tropical Pacific. If this climate feature continues to develop, it will influence North American weather patterns for at least the next six months.
Although not all the indicators are as yet consistent with a major El Niño event, the temperatures in the critical region of the tropical Pacific have now been consistently above average for three consecutive months, a condition which experts agree is a pre-requisite for declaring the presence of an El Niño event. The El Niño experts expect that this anomaly will continue for at least the next six months.
Canadian long-range forecasters are also betting it will. For the fall of 2004, they project above normal temperatures for virtually all of Canada, and relatively dry conditions for most of central Canada -- a typical El Niño pattern. Southern Canada is also expected to experience a warm winter, with Ontario likely to have below normal precipitation. However, looking much farther into the future, they suggest another cool, wet summer for Ontario for 2005!
While these experts warn that such long-range forecasts are to be used with a healthy dose of caution, these same seers predicted in late 2003 that the spring of 2004 would be cool and dry in Ontario, while summer would be cool and moist.
Not too shabby, given what really happened.BF
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Henry Hengeveld is the former senior science advisor on climate change at Environment Canada.
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