Canadian farmers infuriated by increases in Trudeau’s carbon tax

Amid Covid crisis, Canada is facing one more crisis that is related to farmers outrage over a steep hike in Carbon taxes that growers complain will make the produce globally uncompetitive. PM Justin Trudeau announced the plan called “A Healthy Environment and a Healthy Economy” from Environment and Climate Change Canada” on December 11th, This has sparked dismay in Canada’s agriculture industry. The industry journal Western Producer noted that this “represents a 465% increase in Canada’s default carbon tax rate in less than 10 years”. Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association have warned that this will lead to an increase in prices of groceries for all Canadians.

According to the government’s new climate action plan to achieve net zero emissions in 2050, it announced that it will “increase the carbon price by $15 per year starting in 2023”, raising it to “$170 per tonne in 2030.”In the original plan laid out in 2016, the Liberal Party government had imposed a carbon tax of $20 per tonne, rising to $50 in 2022. A statement issued by Trudeau’s office said, “With the end of the first five years approaching, it is now time to provide longer-term certainty on the price of pollution out to 2030.” The increase could cost western Canadian farmers millions of dollars a year in extra taxes and increase costs for heating farm buildings, drying grain, moving commodities by rail and buying essential farm inputs, such as fertiliser and machinery. It quoted the general manager of the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan Duane Haave as saying, “This would be a major hit to farm margins and viability.”

Meanwhile,Canada reported 501,189 confirmed cases by Saturday evening, with the total number of fatalities from the deadly respiratory disease rising to 14,154.  The nationwide tally of coronavirus infections have now crossed the grim half-a-million mark.12,000 Canadians have already received shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine. The current numbers have put the country “on a trajectory for a strong resurgence for the next two months”.