CITI heifer program

[gcreekrch]

Earlier grassfarmer was enquiring about the CITI heifer reallocation schedule. Is this an Alberta only program, or is it Canada wide? I haven't received anything in the mail and was wondering. Thanks for any input.

[farmers_son]

It was Alberta only.

Due to the way that Alberta collected cattle inventory information for CAIS bred heifers were grouped with bred cows while other provinces had bred heifers listed as a separate line item.

When the federal government came out with a CITI program that paid 50% of the loss in value of inventory producers in other provinces collected a payment on the loss of value on bred heifers because the necessary information on heifer numbers had been collected for CAIS (bred heifers had been broken out as a separate line item). Most Alberta producers were overlooked, assuming their heifers were actually cows which did not receive an adjustment.

The Alberta Beef Producers noticed the omission and lobbied hard to have Alberta producers paid. This resulted in Alberta cattle producers receiving an additional $25 million in CITI payments.

The deadline for returning the forms was December 31 but that has been extended until February. You should have received the necessary forms early last December. They were not hard to fill out, they just need to know how many of your bred cows/bred heifers were actually cows and how many were actually heifers.

To be clear, this is not money that Alberta got that the rest of the country did not. It was money that should have been paid to all cattle producers but was not paid in Alberta. That error is being corrected now.

[grassfarmer]

Yeah, I can't wait for the big CITI cheque to roll in. I hope it's better than the last two - $29.03 "cost of production" payment and $212.10 "kickstart Agri invest fund" What a joke - doesn't go far in wintering 300 head.

[gcreekrch]

Thanks for the info. Here in BC, CAIS gave most of us a big overpayment for the estimated 2003 year. Personally, it took until mid 2007 to get the mess straitened out, but we did get a little more money in end for 03,04,and 05, collectively. COPP gave my wife and I each $122.21 and we both get about $870 for the startup. I wonder if the general public knows how far the 600 million went individually? I fuelled up my F550 and had to take $8.50 out of my pocket to add to the COPP cheque to pay for it!

[farmers_son]

I believe you can expect $134 per bred heifer.

[per]

Just a caution, going back and changing the age class could have a negative effect on your reference margin in the next year. Do the calculations first and then decide whether or not it is worth making the change.