Anger in Canada’s pork industry over federal carbon tax

Ontario Pork pointed out that there are no viable alternatives to fossil fuels in swine farming, and that the exemption is “essential in lightening the financial burden” farmers are experiencing at a time of other very high input costs. Because one cannot farm pigs without barn heating, “the carbon tax has added financial strain,” said Ontario Pork, “increasing the cost of production without reducing emissions.”

The carbon tax, it added, is also negatively affecting the competitiveness of the pork sector in domestic and international markets. “Canadian farmers face hurdles that producers in other jurisdictions do not,” the group observed.

Swine farmers in Canada are already exempt, as are other producers, from having to pay a tax on the emissions they create from burning natural gas or propane for barn heating, drying grain and preparing feed. That became law in March 2023.