Canadian Cattle Families Face Troubled Times
CANADA - A new report by the National Farmers Union is painting a bleak picture for Canadian cattle producers.
20 November 2008
1 minute read
According to TheCanadianPress, the report released Wednesday states that, adjusted for inflation, Canadian farmers and independent feeders are receiving half as much for their cattle as they did from the 1940s through the 1980s.
"These half-price cattle are bankrupting family farmers across Canada and creating the most severe crisis in the sector since the Great Depression," says the 128-page document.
It says that between 1942 and 1989, cattle prices more or less kept pace with inflation. The average price for the 47-year period was $174 per hundred-weight - double the recent average.
But over the past two decades price increases for other goods have been twice as large as the price increases for live cattle, according to the report, report TheCanadianPress.
It says if fed cattle prices had kept pace with other prices, cattle today would sell for approximately double their current values.
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