CFIA Says It’s Getting Out Of Seed Certification

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SUNSET CLAUSE: Pedigreed seed growers are unhappy with federal plans to off-load the cost of certifying pedigreed seed.

The federal government’s plan to stop certifying pedigreed seed in five years will add cost and as well as undermine the integrity of pedigreed seed, seed growers warn.

Since seed is the foundation of all agricultural production — food, feed, fibre and fuel — all of Canadian agriculture will be affected, Dale Adolphe, executive of the Canadian Seed Growers Association (CSGA) says.

“This appears to be a unilateral decision on the part of government to impose things without any in-depth thought as to the cost/benefit of it,” Adolphe said in an interview July 15.

The CSGA will lobby Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz and other cabinet members to reconsider the change, Adolphe said.

For more than 100 years Ottawa has provided independent, third-party certification that Canadian pedigreed seed meets specific purity.

That’s going to change, Mike Scheffel, national manager of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s (CFIA) seed section, told the joint annual meeting of the CSGA and Canadian Seed Trade Association in Kelowna July 7-9. CFIA plans to shift seed certification within five years to the CSGA or another body if the CSGA is unwilling to do it.

The news shocked CSGA members and its board, Adolphe said. Going back to the early 1900s, seed growers and the federal government have worked closely on the pedigreed seed system and subsequent changes.

The CSGA is part of a government-industry working group reviewing seed certification and was looking at ways to make the system more efficient and reduce CFIA’s costs.

A month and a half ago CFIA told the committee it needs to cut its seed certification budget for 2011-12 by $428,000. But then it announced it’s getting out of seed certification altogether — a decision that the CSGA was not consulted about, Adolphe said.

In the interim, CFIA also announced it’s going to full cost recovery, which will double what growers now pay CFIA to certify a crop. In Manitoba CFIA’s fee will jump to $1.50 an acre from 75 cents.

It might not sound like a lot, but it will add to that gap that already exists between the price of certified and common seed, Adolphe said.

“It just keeps adding to that spread between what we want to offer and what a guy will go to the bin for,” said Craig Riddell, president of the Manitoba Seed Growers Association.

CFIA says it spends $3.2 million a year certifying 1.1 million acres of seed for all crops, except potatoes.

“Three million seems to be a paltry cost,” Riddell said. “The fact that we’re arguing over that is ridiculous.

“I think the Canadian taxpayer is getting very good value for the service CFIA

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