AgriRecovery Framework: The 2017 Canada-British Columbia Wildfires Recovery Initiative

The 2017 Canada-British Columbia Wildfires Recovery Initiative will provide up to $20 million to assist agricultural producers with the extraordinary costs incurred to recover from the adverse effects of this year’s wildfires. The assistance will cover extraordinary costs including:

• Up to 70 per cent of extraordinary feed costs, including transportation to feed livestock through the recovery period;
• Up to $80 per head to re-establish safe winter feeding facilities and general cleanup;
• Up to 70 per cent of the veterinary, mustering, transportation and rental of temporary production facilities;
• Up to 70 per cent of the market value of breeding animals for mortality;
• Up to 70 per cent of extraordinary costs incurred by an industry organization and not paid by another agency or government department; and
• Up to 70 per cent of the extraordinary costs required to return to normal crop production, including:
  • Critical infrastructure not covered by insurance.
  • Labour costs to repair private fences.
  • Reseeding/re-establishment of tame forage and other perennials damaged by fires.

A federal-provincial-territorial cost-shared suite of Business Risk Management (BRM) programs is available to assist farmers in managing disaster events, including wildfires. These include AgriStability, AgriInvest and AgriInsurance.

AgriRecovery is a federal-provincial-territorial disaster relief framework under Growing Forward 2, intended to work together with the core BRM programs to assist agricultural producers to recover from natural disasters. AgriRecovery initiatives are cost-shared on a 60:40 basis between the federal government and participating provinces or territories.

Governments will continue to work with industry in the coming weeks on the initiative specifics to ensure that it meets producers’ needs, while being delivered in a simple and timely manner. For more information about the initiative, please contact 1-888-332-3352.