Premier Scott Moe on Tuesday named David Marit, MLA for the southwestern riding of Wood River since 2016 an minister for agriculture and Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corp. since 2018, as minister responsible for the WSA.

In the added role, Marit takes over from Battlefords MLA Jeremy Cockrill, who was named Tuesday as minister of education. Cockrill had served until now as minister of highways, a post which on Tuesday went to Estevan MLA Lori Carr.

The province set up the WSA in 2012 to handle most of the provincial government’s water management responsibilities, including oversight of water supplies, protection of water quality, safety of drinking water and treatment of wastewater, as well as ownership and management of 72 dams and related water channels.

The WSA isn’t to be confused with SaskWater, the Crown-owned water utility, which provides water, water treatment and wastewater services to several communities, rural pipeline groups and industrial and commercial users.

That corporation also gets new political oversight; Dustin Duncan was named Tuesday as minister for Crown Investments Corp. and minister responsible for SaskWater as well as Crown-owned SaskPower, SaskEnergy, SaskTel and SGI. Duncan, the MLA for Weyburn-Big Muddy, was until Tuesday the minister for education.

Among other affected cabinet portfolios of interest to farmers, Christine Tell becomes minister of environment, while Paul Merriman moves over from the health file to replace Tell as minister of corrections, policing and public safety and minister responsible for the provincial Firearms Secretariat. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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RJ Sigurdson, MLA for the constituency of Highwood, just south of Calgary, was sworn in Friday by Lt.-Gov. Salma Lakhani as Alberta’s new minister of agriculture and irrigation, replacing Nate Horner.

Horner, the MLA for Drumheller-Stettler since 2019 and the province’s ag minister since late 2021, was shuffled Friday to become Premier Danielle Smith’s new finance minister and president of Alberta Treasury Board. In that role, Horner replaces Jason Nixon, who in turn was named Friday as minister for seniors and community and social services.

Sigurdson also first came to the legislature in the 2019 election and was named last October as Smith’s parliamentary secretary for EMS reform. He easily held his seat in last month’s provincial election ahead of NDP challenger Jessica Hallam by a spread of 10,450 votes.

Before entering provincial politics, Sigurdson was a senior project/general manager with, and shareholder in, Avalanche Air Systems, a Calgary-area commercial HVAC and sheet metal contracting firm.

Sigurdson’s experience in the ag file includes growing up on a small family farm north of Cochrane and working on neighbouring farms in his teens.

READ MORE: Pre-election reports analyze Alberta’s ag issues

“I am so pleased to have this team working with me to deliver on the promises we made to Albertans during the election,” Smith said of the new 25-member cabinet in a release Friday. “These are not just our government’s priorities, they are Albertans’ priorities.”

Those priorities, the government said, include “continuing to grow and diversify the economy, keeping life affordable, reforming the health care system, tackling crime, providing help for those struggling and defending Alberta’s interests.”

Smith also announced a shuffle of deputy ministers Friday, but Jason Hale, a former MLA (2012-15) and rancher, remains as the province’s senior ag bureaucrat, a position he’s held since last October.

Among other cabinet posts of interest to farmers, former municipal affairs minister Rebecca Schulz becomes minister of environment and protected areas; Matt Jones, former minister for affordability and utilities, becomes minister of jobs, economy and trade; and Devin Dreeshen, a former ag minister, remains in his pre-election portfolio as minister of transportation and economic corridors. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Premier David Eby, who assumed the post last month following John Horgan’s resignation, on Wednesday shuffled the provincial cabinet and named Abbotsford-Mission MLA Pam Alexis to handle the ag and food portfolio.

As ag minister, Alexis replaces Saanich South MLA Lana Popham, who had handled the file since 2017. Popham was shuffled Wednesday to the tourism, arts, culture and sport file.

A teacher by profession, Alexis has previously served as a vice-president for the Mission Chamber of Commerce and for the B.C. Winter Games. After a stint as a school trustee (2005-11), she served as a councilor (2014-18) and mayor (2018-20) for the city of Mission.

She moved into provincial politics with the 2020 election, in which she unseated Liberal incumbent Simon Gibson, whose party had held the Abbotsford-Mission riding since its formation in 2009.

“I am thrilled to get started, rolling up my sleeves now,” Alexis, a first-time cabinet minister, said Wednesday on Facebook, adding that having an agriculture minister in the Fraser Valley “will resonate with local residents.”

Relative to its land base, the Fraser Valley plays a significantly outsized role in B.C. agriculture, representing almost a third of the province’s farms and over a third of the province’s gross farm receipts. It also has over a third of the province’s poultry and egg farms and over half of the province’s dairy farms.

Eby’s other cabinet appointments of interest to farmers include:

• North Vancouver-Lonsdale MLA Bowinn Ma, leading a new ministry of emergency management and climate readiness;
• Vancouver-Fairview MLA George Heyman, returning as minister for environment and climate change strategy;
• Surrey-Fleetwood MLA Jagrup Brar, as minister of state for trade;
• Stikine MLA Nathan Cullen, formerly minister of state for lands and natural resource operations, now minister of water, land and resource stewardship (fisheries);
• Parksville-Qualicum MLA and farmer/businessman Adam Walker, formerly parliamentary secretary for the new economy, now parliamentary secretary for sustainable economy; and
• Boundary-Similkameen MLA Roly Russell, returning as parliamentary secretary for rural development.

B.C.’s ag sector, and the Fraser Valley’s in particular, is still recovering from last fall’s destructive floods, which Eby, in his mandate letter to Alexis on Wednesday, described as the largest agricultural disaster in the province’s history.

The province — and again, the Fraser Valley in particular — has also been battered by outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in its poultry and egg sectors this year.

The province has seen 75 outbreaks of high-path avian flu in domestic birds (poultry and non-poultry) so far in 2022, affecting an estimated 1.18 million birds in total. That count includes 46 outbreaks on commercial poultry operations in the past four weeks alone.

Eby’s mandate letter to Alexis calls for her to continue to work on recommendations of the provincial Food Security Task Force to “make B.C. a leader in agricultural innovation, resilience and food security in the face of emerging challenges of supply chain disruption, global inflation, rising costs and the impacts of climate change.”

The letter also calls for her to “support the resilience of B.C.’s food system through an emergency preparedness strategy for food security,” working with the emergency management and climate readiness ministry.

It also calls on Alexis to “work with industry to identify agricultural best practices that reduce carbon pollution and support their adoption across the sector.” — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Stefanson, who replaced Brian Pallister as premier in November, on Tuesday named Interlake-Gimli MLA Derek Johnson as minister of agriculture, replacing Lakeside MLA Ralph Eichler, who has been dropped from cabinet.

The move also sees the provincial ministry of agriculture and resource development split back into separate files, as former finance minister Scott Fielding, MLA for the Winnipeg riding of Kirkfield Park, becomes minister of natural resources and northern development. The agriculture and resource development files had been merged into one ministry in 2019 under then-minister Blaine Pedersen.

Johnson, a bank branch manager before entering provincial politics, first came to the legislature in 2016, was re-elected in 2019 and was named Pallister’s municipal relations minister in January last year. He also served as a councilor in the R.M. of St. Laurent from 2010 to 2014.

“I look forward to continuing to assist our producers as we move forward from last year’s drought, and support strong agriculture production in Manitoba,” Johnson said in a separate statement Tuesday.

Keystone Agricultural Producers (KAP) president Bill Campbell, in a separate release Tuesday, said Johnson “understands the challenges facing Manitoba’s agricultural industry and we look forward to working with him.”

KAP, he said, has also “valued Minister Eichler’s desire to grow the industry through his various roles in public office and wish him the best.”

Eileen Clarke, MLA for the Neepawa-area riding of Agassiz, returns to the municipal relations file, “a position she held previously and in which she was well respected among her colleagues across all levels of government,” Stefanson said in a release Tuesday. Clarke was Pallister’s minister for Indigenous and northern relations before quitting his cabinet last July.

Stefanson, in announcing the shuffle and reorganization, said “the most pressing issues facing Manitoba and Manitobans will be viewed through a whole-of-government approach including the COVID-19 response and recovery, climate change and mitigation, and reconciliation.”

Among other files of interest to farmers, Turtle Mountain MLA Doyle Piwniuk joins cabinet as minister of transportation and infrastructure; Spruce Woods MLA Cliff Cullen becomes deputy premier and minister for economic development, investment and trade; and Jeff Wharton, the MLA for Red River North, becomes minister for environment, climate and parks. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Dr. Andrew Furey, who was sworn in Wednesday to replace Dwight Ball as premier, announced a new cabinet the same day for the province’s Liberal minority government.

Elvis Loveless, the rookie MHA for the southern Newfoundland riding of Fortune Bay-Cape La Hune, was named Wednesday as the new minister for fisheries, forestry and agriculture.

Furey’s announcement included the “realignment of a number of government departments,” with further details expected in “coming days.”

Agriculture until now has been an arm of the provincial fisheries and land resources department, and had previously been under the natural resources department’s oversight until 2015.

Loveless, originally from Seal Cove, had been active in provincial politics for years before recapturing Fortune Bay for the Liberals in last May’s election. He was named by Ball in June last year as parliamentary secretary to the minister of fisheries and land resources.

Gerry Byrne, the incumbent minister for fisheries and land resources since 2017, was named Wednesday as Furey’s minister for immigration, skills and labour and minister responsible for Workplace NL.

The Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Agriculture on Wednesday tweeted congratulations for Loveless on the new post and said it “look(s) forward to working with you in the future,” while also thanking Byrne “for his support for the agriculture industry in N.L.” — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Bibeau will join her colleagues — including returning Transport Minister Marc Garneau and new Labour Minister Filomena Tassi, a Hamilton MP and former minister for seniors — in having to deal immediately with calls for Parliament to be reconvened early to pass back-to-work legislation for striking rail workers.

Tassi’s office is expected to take the lead role in handling the CN strike. Earlier this week about 3,000 conductors, train workers and yard workers at Canadian National Railway went on strike, affecting bulk freight traffic and movement of western Canadian grain.

That has prompted calls from industry leaders and some provincial governments for Parliament to reconvene before its scheduled return on Dec. 5.

Ministers were non-committal on the option of back-to-work legislation to end the strike. Tassi told reporters following her swearing-in that she had spoken with both parties and her priority is to ensure they are working hard to come to an agreement.

“We feel there is a solution at hand” and a “light at the end of the tunnel,” Garneau said.

Bibeau is also facing continued calls for business risk management (BRM) and advanced payment programs to be redeveloped. Grain Growers of Canada is continuing to ask the federal government to have coverage of margin losses below 85 per cent be included along with the removal of the reference margin limit.

Industry sources have identified key issues the government should address, including the trade, public and legal pressures on glyphosate, updating the Canada Grain Act and setting up a process to raise funds for varietal development through royalties on farm-saved seed.

Bibeau — who has meetings scheduled next month with her provincial counterparts, where BRM programs are expected to be a priority — said she “looks forward” to those meetings.

“We’re working with the industry, we’re working with our colleagues from the different provinces to try and get the best strategy,” she said. “This is definitely a very high priority for me.”

It’s expected Bibeau will also continue to play a part in expanding international market access for producers and working to end a ban on Canadian canola exports to China.

That ban stems from the arrest of Huawei Technologies executive Meng Wanzhou at the request of the United States, after which Chinese authorities also detained two Canadians, accusing them of espionage.

The two detained Canadians remain a priority for the federal government, and the issue of a canola ban will take a backseat to this, meaning the foreign affairs department and its new minister, Francois-Philippe Champagne, will take the lead on engaging China.

Bibeau has handled the agriculture portfolio since March and is generally spoken of highly by those within industry who work with her.

“We are looking forward to continuing our relationship with Minister Bibeau and the Cabinet as a whole over the coming months and years,” Grain Growers of Canada chair Jeff Nielsen in a release. “We are ready to carry on the important work of ensuring a competitive environment where Canadian agriculture can survive and thrive.”

“Over the past nine months, producers have appreciated (Bibeau’s) availability to hear concerns and work on solutions,” Rick bergmann, chair of the Canadian Pork Council, said in a separate statement. “The collaboration shown by staff under her leadership has been very much appreciated by the pork sector.”

“We look forward to working with Minister Bibeau and discussing the CFA’s key priorities,” Canadian Federation of Agriculture president Mary Robinson said in a separate release.

Among the priorities Robinson listed were the CN rail strike, trade issues, business risk management programming, rural infrastructure funding and funding for climate-change related ag research.

Farmers are also looking for relief from costs associated with carbon pricing, including recognition of practices already taking place to reduce carbon emissions.

That file goes to Vancouver MP Jonathan Wilkinson, the new minister for environment and climate change. Before last month’s election, Wilkinson had served as fisheries minister and, previously, as parliamentary secretary on the environment file.

Wilkinson was considered a natural choice to take over the position from Catherine McKenna, because of his previous work in the sector. Wilkinson also has roots in Saskatchewan, as he worked for former Premier Roy Romanow.

Overall the cabinet favours Ontario and Quebec regionally, but the Liberal minority government is trying to assure voters, particularly in Alberta and Saskatchewan, that they are not blind to regional differences. To that end, Manitoba MP Jim Carr, undergoing treatment for a form of blood cancer, has been named as “special advisor” for the Prairies.

No Liberals were elected in Alberta or Saskatchewan, increasing regional tensions and concerns those provinces would be left without a voice at the cabinet table. Carr was not sworn into cabinet, but Chrystia Freeland will try to calm tensions in her new position as deputy prime minister and minister of intergovernmental affairs.

Among other cabinet posts of interest to farmers, Toronto-area MP Mary Ng becomes minister for international trade; and Peterborough MP Maryam Monsef becomes minister for rural economic development.

— D.C. Fraser reports for Glacier FarmMedia from Ottawa. Includes files from Glacier FarmMedia Network staff.

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Premier Brian Pallister on Wednesday announced a reorganization of his government’s ministries along with a shuffle of his cabinet in the wake of his Progressive Conservative government’s re-election last month.

The realignment sees the agriculture ministry become part of a new department, agriculture and resource development, which was described Wednesday as “an expanded department focused on agriculture and natural resources, including watershed districts, GROW programming, forestry, mining, fish and wildlife management.”

Apart from agriculture, the new ministry picks up responsibilities handled until now by the previous department of sustainable development and department of growth, enterprise and trade. The latter department’s minister, Midland MLA Blaine Pedersen, was named Wednesday to lead the new department.

Pedersen hails from Elm Creek and worked over 30 years in the cattle feeding business before becoming the MLA for what was then the Carman constituency in 2007.

He served as the Tories’ opposition critic for agriculture, food and rural initiatives from 2011 until the party returned to power in 2016; he then served as minister for infrastructure from 2016 into 2017, when he was named to handle the growth, enterprise and trade file.

As agriculture minister, Pedersen replaces Lakeside MLA Ralph Eichler, who’d held the post since 2016 and was shuffled Wednesday to lead another newly formed department, economic development and training.

The “GROW programming” now listed among Pedersen’s responsibilities refers to the $52 million Growing Outcomes in Watersheds trust.

The trust, which until now was a responsibility of the sustainable development department, was set up in June to back programming for the protection of wetlands and watershed management.

Pallister on Tuesday separately announced new GROW trust funding for three separate programs. The Seine-Rat River Conservation District and Little Saskatchewan River Conservation District each receive $250,000 to expand their ALUS Canada ecological goods and services programs, while up to $1 million goes to the TransCanada Shelterbelt Renewal Project.

Among other provincial portfolios of interest to farmers, Fort Richmond MLA Sarah Guillemard was named Wednesday as minister for conservation and climate, while Riel MLA Rochelle Squires, the former sustainable development minister, will now handle the municipal relations file.

The reorganization, Pallister said Wednesday, will “create areas of focus consistent with our priorities and our vision to move Manitoba forward.” — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Marie-Claude Bibeau, MP for the Quebec riding of Compton-Stanstead since 2015, replaced Lawrence MacAulay as agriculture minister on Friday, becoming the first woman to handle the ag portfolio.

MacAulay, the ag minister since 2015 and a Prince Edward Island MP since 1988, becomes minister of veterans’ affairs and associate minister of defence, replacing Wilson-Raybould, who resigned from cabinet on Feb. 12.

Bibeau until now has served as minister of international development. In 2015 she won the Compton-Stanstead riding by a spread of almost 5,300 votes over incumbent New Democrat MP Jean Rousseau. The Bloc Quebecois had previously held the seat from 2004 to 2011.

On the international development file, Bibeau “helped refocus Canada’s international assistance on helping the poorest and most vulnerable people and on supporting fragile states,” Trudeau’s office said Friday in a release.

In 2017, she launched Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy, aimed at prioritizing gender equality in international assistance programming, the PMO noted.

Before entering politics, Bibeau worked for the former Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and later became a businesswoman in Quebec’s Eastern Townships.

As ag minister, her “overarching goal is to support the agricultural sector in a way that allows it to be a leader in job creation and innovation,” Trudeau’s office said Friday.

“Knowing that Canada’s farmers, ranchers and food processors are the foundation of our food sector, she will help Canada’s agriculture sector be more innovative, safer, and stronger.”

Among the industry organizations responding to Friday’s announcement, Grain Farmers of Ontario said it looks forward to working with Bibeau on issues such as business risk management programs, finalizing the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement and “expansion into new markets including a free trade agreement with China.”

The Canadian Pork Council said it also looks forward to meeting with Bibeau in “the near future” to discuss files such as African swine fever prevention and establishment of a national pork promotion and research agency.

The pork council on Friday also hailed MacAulay’s work on the African swine fever file as “vital to the sector and (driving) the prevention efforts of the country. We also appreciate the relations he built with key stakeholders in the United States.”

Alberta’s wheat and barley commissions, in a separate statement, hailed MacAulay’s “key role in securing several political wins for farmers” including the passage of Bill C-49, which they said “paves the way for long-term solutions to the rail transportation challenges that farmers have faced for decades.”

MacAulay, they said, “also played a critical role in supporting the commissions’ successful lobbying efforts to retain the cash ticket deferral mechanism, following threats of its elimination in the March 2017 federal budget.”

MacAulay, a farmer and businessman before entering politics as MP for the P.E.I. riding of Cardigan, is no stranger to the veterans’ affairs file, having previously served as secretary of state for veterans from 1994 to 1997.

Before his appointment as ag minister, MacAulay also served stints as labour minister and solicitor general. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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In the shuffle, following the departure of Treasury Board president Scott Brison from cabinet, Trudeau on Monday called up Bernadette Jordan, MP for the southern Nova Scotia riding of South Shore-St.Margaret’s, to head a newly created portfolio as minister of rural economic development.

The appointment is a first in that Jordan becomes the first-ever female federal cabinet minister representing a Nova Scotia riding. A dedicated federal portfolio for rural economic development isn’t technically a first, although one hasn’t existed since the forestry and rural development department of 1966-69.

In her new role Jordan is expected to oversee “the creation of a rural development strategy to spur economic growth and create good, middle-class jobs in rural Canada,” Trudeau’s office said in a release Monday.

“She will also take action to bring high-speed internet to more rural households and businesses, and work with municipalities, provinces, territories and Indigenous partners to meet the unique and diverse infrastructure needs of rural communities.”

Before her election to the Commons in 2015, Jordan served as a development officer for the Health Services Foundation in Bridgewater, N.S.

Monday’s appointment is a promotion for Jordan, who from last August until now had served as parliamentary secretary for the minister of democratic institutions, Ontario MP Karina Gould.

As an MP, Jordan has also chaired the Atlantic Liberal caucus and served a stint last year as chair the Commons standing committee on fisheries and oceans.

The Canadian Federation of Agriculture, in a separate release Monday, hailed the creation of the new ministerial position as “clearly demonstrat(ing) the importance of our rural communities” and their businesses.

“As a rural-based industry, the competitiveness of Canada’s agri-food industry is intimately connected to the vibrancy of rural communities and critically important to Canada’s economic growth,” the CFA said.

“We look forward to working with Minister Jordan and discussing the CFA’s key rural priorities which include introducing long-term, predictable infrastructure funding with provisions to address the full breadth of rural and agricultural infrastructure needs,” CFA president Ron Bonnett said in the release.

Among those needs, he said, are dealing with “transportation bottlenecks” as well as providing “access to clean water and wastewater treatment, infrastructure that leverages on-farm renewable energy production and enables access to natural gas, and access to modern, affordable high-speed internet.” — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Alan McIsaac, the MLA for Vernon River-Stratford since 2007 and the province’s ag minister since 2015, announced Wednesday he won’t run in the next provincial election, scheduled for October next year.

“Given this, I feel it is the right time to no longer serve in cabinet and to focus on my constituents,” he said in a release.

The departures of McIsaac and Finance Minister Allen Roach — who also announced Wednesday he won’t seek re-election — have spurred Premier Wade MacLauchlan to shuffle his cabinet.

MacLauchlan on Wednesday named Robert Henderson, the MLA for O’Leary-Inverness since 2007, to replace McIsaac as ag and fisheries minister.

Henderson lives at Freeland, about 40 km north of Summerside, where he previously grew potatoes and blueberries and raised beef cattle. He has also previously worked as an economic development officer and employment counselor.

Henderson had served since 2016 as minister of health and wellness and previously as minister of tourism and culture (2011-15). He has also previously sat on the legislature’s standing committee on agriculture and fisheries.

McIsaac, a dairy farmer before entering politics, brought a significant farm policy resume to his stint on the agriculture file, having chaired the province’s milk marketing board and served as an executive member with the P.E.I. Federation of Agriculture and Holstein Canada.

McIsaac had also previously served as education and transportation minister and oversaw the merger of the agriculture and fisheries files, which previously were handled separately in the agriculture and forestry ministry and fisheries, aquaculture and rural development ministry. — AGCanada.com Network

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