Farmscape for October 31, 2016

Manitoba Pork is hoping streamlining the process involved in getting approval for the construction of new hog barns will speed up the procedure and reduce the costs.
In April, 2015, to facilitate the construction of new swine production capacity to address a shortfall of pigs for processing, the Manitoba government introduced the Pig Production Special Pilot Project Evaluation Protocol.
Four applications for construction permits under the protocol, two for new barns and two for expansions, are under review.
Mike Teillet, the Manager of Sustainable Development Programs with Manitoba Pork, says a key stumbling block has been the complicated approval process.

Clip-Mike Teillet-Manitoba Pork:
Generally speaking one of the things that we've been concerned about for a number of years are approval processes and the complexity and bureaucratic nature of those approval processes.
We have been consulting with the government over the last few months to try to look at ways of streamlining those processes.
These processes are so complicated that your average farmer really can't do it by himself anymore.
He or she really has to hire a professional consultant to walk them through the processes because they're so complex.
We look at that and we think that, if we can reduce the amount of red tape involved, that it might not only reduce the amount of time but also the amount of cost involved for a producer in order to actually go through all of the approval process.
Right now the process takes somewhere between nine months and a year and our goal is to try to reduce that by at least 50 percent.

Teillet notes the approval process deals with at least three different government departments and spans a number of different pieces of legislation.
He says a number of approaches are being looked at to streamline the process while still protecting the environment.
For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

       *Farmscape is a presentation of Sask Pork and Manitoba Pork