Agriculture Minister Lyle Stewart has mixed views on the new Canadian Agricultural Partnership.

The new CAP (cap) agreement comes into effect April 1st,2018 to replace the Growing Forward 2 round of Business Risk Management programming.

Stewart says among the program improvements AgriStability’s reference margin limits will be changed to ensure a more equitable level of support, guaranteeing producers at least 70% of their reference margin.

"Generally speaking the program didn't work very well for producers with lower production costs," he said. "Not exclusively, but certainly including cow calf producers that for instance put up their own feed, rather than purchasing feed. It will be a program that will work much better for folks like them with lower production cost.  

One change Saskatchewan does not and will not approve was pushed thru by the Federal Government giving producers the option to enrol late in AgriStability. ie: coming into the program when they have a wreck whether it’s part way through or at the end of the season:

"The provinces have been given the right to trigger this or not," he stated. "Saskatchewan will not be triggering late participation so it will be enrollment as usual for Saskatchewan producers, we want to make that very clear right at the outset so there is no confusion."

He notes there will be a review of the suite of programs over the next year to see if there are any tweaks that need to be made.