Fall rebound for farm product prices

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

by SUSAN MANN

The prices farmers received for their livestock and animal products rose 15.8 per cent in October as several factors affecting prices last year didn’t have as much impact this year, says a Statistics Canada spokesperson.

In 2009 cattle and hog prices were affected by the U.S. country of origin labelling law, concerns about the H1N1 flu virus and lower demand because of the world economic situation. Gail-Ann Breese, head of the farm income and price section, says those situations were less of a factor this October compared to October, 2009.

Inventories of cattle, calves and hogs on Canadian farms have decreased a lot and that’s one of the factors that will influence the prices, Breese says.

The livestock and animal product price index comparing this October to October, 2009 was released today as part of Statistics Canada’s Farm Product Price Index.

In October, 2010 increases were recorded in all livestock commodities except poultry. In addition to prices being higher than a year ago, the livestock and animal products index was up 1.1 per cent in October compared to September.

On the crop side, the prices farmers received for crops in October were 1.5 per cent higher compared to October, 2009. There were increases in all commodities except specialty crops. The overall crop index recorded its second year-over-year increase following 21 months of year-over-year decreases. But the total crops index fell 0.4 per cent in October compared to the September index as potatoes and fruit declined.

The combination of increases in the livestock and animal product index plus the crops index led to an 8.5 per cent increase in prices farmers received for commodities in October compared to October, 2009. BF