It looks like Saskatchewan farmers are exempt from the Province’s Made-in-Saskatchewan Climate Change Strategy.

The Strategy called Prairie Resilience was released earlier this week and doesn’t include a Carbon Tax.

Environment Minister Dustin Duncan says a carbon tax would be very harmful to our economy without actually reducing emissions.

He notes instead they are looking at developing and implementing sector-specific output-based performance standards on large emitting facilities, such as those in oil, gas, and mining:

"We are only looking at the industries that are emitting over 25,000 tons per year of emissions, most likely carbon dioxide," he said. "We're not coming to the farm and checking out individual producers, regarding their emissions, we are exempting primary production."

Duncan says stakeholder consultations will begin in early 2018.

The Trudeau Government called on the Province’s earlier this year to implement $10 a tonne tax on carbon dioxide emissions as of January 1, 2018.  

The  Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan is pleased with the direction the Province’s new Made-in-Saskatchewan Climate Change Strategy is taking.

The Prairie Resilience Strategy doesn’t include a Carbon Tax and has an exemption for farmers.

APAS President Todd Lewis is happy with what he sees.

"We have been doing lots of work in agriculture over the number of decades to get a low carbon ag environment," he said. "That's what we do, everything, when we talk about efficiency it's all apart from using less fuel, which is low carbon, or if it comes to grazing practices and all those things."

Stakeholder consultations will begin early in the New Year on the Province’s plan … Prairie Resilience – A Made-in-Saskatchewan Climate Change Strategy.