The Canada Emergency Response Benefit has provided financial support for businesses that have lost income due to the pandemic. Unfortunately, there has been little support for farmers like Amy Hill of Nova Scotia’s Snowy River Farm, whose income remained stable but expenses increased significantly, such as paying for in-home child care after the closure of schools and daycares.
The COVID-19 pandemic has made an impact on all aspects of modern life, but how has it affected smaller farms across Canada? Small Farm Canada has conducted a survey of people in the sector to find out.
1) How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the bottom line for your business?
Cedric MacLeod, Local Valley Beef, NB: Our restaurant trade is off significantly, but we’ve seen a fairly significant jump in interest at the household level. We’ve moved a fair amount of product that way. I don’t think we’re going to see a major increase or decrease; it’s just going to be flat.
Stefan Regnier, Blue Lagoon Organics, MB: I’ve actually never been busier.
Stefan Regnier of Manitoba’s Blue Lagoon Organics says that while much of his business was based around farmer’s markets that have been closed, he’s kept extremely busy with online orders of eggs and produce.
Connie Phillips, Alberta Beekeepers Commission, AB: The delay in getting temporary foreign workers in delayed the start of the season significantly. Beekeepers lost about six weeks of production. And they had additional costs to modify the residences for seasonal workers to ensure safety.
Ben Nichols, Nichols Farm, PQ: It’s gonna be tight. We had to dump some milk once, they said they were going to pay for it, but in the end they cut the price of milk by 9% and they only let us ship so much milk so we had to cut our production. We were supposed to be building up the herd for a new barn coming this fall but I had to slam on the brakes and just ride it out.
Amy Hill, Snowy River Farm, NS: On one hand, it seems really good because we saw sales jump when everything closed and we had to stay open. But we usually have WWOOFers here almost year round. When the pandemic hit, we lost all of the opportunity for that to happen.
Pam Miller, Miller’s By-Gone Farm, SK: It’s been really good. We were already set up with an online store. When customers wanted to start shopping local, we were already here and doing it.
2) What changes have you had to make as a result of the pandemic?
MacLeod: The biggest change was moving from a restaurant trade, which takes a lot of volume and moving to home delivery. We have to make basically 15 home visits to equal a restaurant drop off.
Regnier: We doubled down on the CSA (community supported agriculture) program through March and April. And it’s prompted an online store.
Phillip Hamming, Hamming Farm, PEI: I’ve had a lot more time because I can’t go anywhere, so if anything, it accelerated my move and the establishment of my new farm.
Hill: Typically we would have offered on-farm pickup but we had to cancel that and just do deliveries entirely. We have lost some major customers that we’ve had for years because typically they would be picking up at markets and such. We had to build an online store, we never had that before.
3) Are the changes you’ve made going to be permanent or do you expect things to revert to “normal” at some point?
MacLeod: It’s forced us to have some conversations with our processor about what our relationship looks like long term. They were very, very busy and had to turn people away because they didn’t have the capacity.
Regnier: We spent money on portable hand wash stations and washing your hands is never going to go out of fashion.
Hill: Once the markets open back up, we’d like to continue with some form of delivery, but maybe not to all areas. The online store is definitely staying.
4) What has been the biggest challenge related to the pandemic?
MacLeod: We had to upgrade our online commerce and make some changes there and keep track of all the orders that were coming in rapid fire.
Regnier: I had some other problems that I was dealing with this year – my dad had a stroke and my brother-in-law died of cancer. Then COVID happened, it was one more layer of concern. I needed help and with social distancing that was very difficult.
Phillips: Even before airlines stopped flying, they put restrictions on flying live animals. So that stopped shipments of bees – just in this province, they bring in 18,000 to 20,000 packages annually. Maybe 6,000 got in.
Hamming: Supply lines, and some of the bureaucracy of getting stuff done with the government. Getting applications put through and waiting on permits to do things – that stuff has been delayed. Everything takes twice as long.
Nichols: You can’t sell your cattle because everybody’s selling cattle and you’ll get a lower price. Also, schools took small milk cartons and restaurants took pallet loads of cheese, but the plants that make them aren’t geared towards retail so they pretty much had to close down those lines.
Hill: Government shut down school and daycare so our only option was to hire someone to come to our home and provide childcare for $500 per week. I think a lot of people thought people can work from home and their productivity might go down, but 75% of our income is going to come from what we’re able to accomplish between March and June. So we can’t be a little less productive, it’s just unacceptable. A secondary issue is we all have terrible internet here, so trying to get those online orders has been a struggle.
Miller: People who had the option were buying baby chicks and putting in gardens. So we had a hard time in the beginning just making sure we were able to source all the products that we needed to produce food because everyone else was jumping on the bandwagon.
5) Were there any new opportunities that were presented due to the pandemic?
MacLeod: I think our greatest opportunity has been to talk to people about New Brunswick agriculture, the importance of it and the complexity of getting a product to market. Food security has risen to the top for a lot of people.
Regnier: We’ll be doing an online store and focusing more on home deliveries. We’re situated about 13 km west of Winnipeg, so deliveries into the city is very practical and easier.
Hill: We have definitely seen a shift in local food support. Getting an online store set up and going through that avenue has been really beneficial. I think we’re going to be able to access people that don’t have time to go to markets on Saturday morning or just prefer to have their produce and meats delivered but do want to support local.
— Matt Jones