Two winners for Egg Farmers' New Entrant program

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

by MATT MCINTOSH

Luc and Marloes Mulder of Chatsworth Ontario, and Kelly and Lisa Linton of Lakeside Ontario are the recipients of this year's New Entrant Quota Loan Pool program.

The program is run by Egg Farmers of Ontario, and is designed to encourage farmers to enter the egg industry.

"It takes a lot of capital to start producing eggs, and the New Entrant program is designed to help alleviate some of the upfront quota costs," says Bill Mitchell, director of public affairs at Egg Farmers of Ontario. “We invite all interested farmers to apply."

The program lends up to 10,000 quota units to each winner, and works on a 1:2 ratio. That is, for every quota unit purchased by the new producer, the program lends two.

After one decade, that loan is paid back to Egg Farmers of Ontario at 10 per cent of the loan cost per year for 10 years.

Applicants have to meet certain requirements in order to be eligible for the program, such as being a permanent resident of Ontario and not holding quota in any other supply-managed sector.

Mitchell says this year's program was significant because, unlike the past two years, two winners were selected instead of one.

"The quality of the applications was great; our selection committee had a hard time narrowing things down," he says. BF