Quebec farmers struggling to cope with 'insane weather events' ravaging their crops

Proud farmers, Wayne and Karen Robinson have been living off their land for 40 years. At their farm near Saint-Eustache, Que., in the Laurentians — about 50 kilometres northwest of Montreal — they grow a variety of crops, including hay for horses.

When the hay is freshly cut, it's soft and feathery, Karen says. "That's what the horses really like. It's like candy to them." 

Once cut, the hay needs three days without rain to dry.

Normally, the Robinsons would have cut their hay three weeks ago, but the bad weather has meant they have had to hold off on the first harvest. The hay, which had grown unusually tall because of the extreme heat, has folded over on itself and now lies in the puddles formed by last week's torrential storms. 

With each passing day, the moisture degrades the crop.

Still tallying the extent of the damage, the Robinsons estimate they have so far lost about half their crop sales, and the customers who want hay to feed their horses are left waiting. But that is not the only loss. The rain has killed some of their soybean plants and washed away the seeds.

The Robinsons are not alone.

As the harvest season continues to be marked by extreme weather, Quebec's farmers are struggling to cope with the impact it is having on their crops. Some are calling for insurance coverage that takes this new reality into account.

Insured for climate change

"We've been doing it for a long, long time … So we know what we're doing. It's just Mother Nature is really changing now," said Karen Robinson.

While the Robinsons' crops are insured with the Financière agricole du Québec (FADQ) — the Crown corporation that serves as Quebec's sole insurance provider for farmers — they cannot recover all their losses, said Wayne Robinson.

Berry farmers have also had to contend with challenging conditions: biting cold, drought and heavy rainfall — all within a single season.

Stéphanie Forcier, director at the Association des producteurs de fraises et de framboises du Québec, the association for Quebec strawberry and raspberry farmers, says the recent heavy rains have not only diminished the quantity of fruit being harvested but have made the berries taste watery too.

"It's really hard for the fruits and strawberries and especially raspberries. They are really fragile fruits," she said.

Forcier says farmers have already lost thousands of dollars, but what they fear most is more losses brought on by the spread of disease among the crops

To make matters worse, only about half of the berry farmers are insured with the FADQ.

"We know that this weather is going to be our 'new normal,' so we need to be more prepared. We need to have better insurance programs for the farmers."

Farmers need the FADQ to make insurance coverage more affordable and comprehensive, says Forcier — or they will not be able to keep feeding Quebecers. 

Right now, she says, farmers are forced to choose what kinds of extreme weather they can afford to get insured for, a situation she says no longer corresponds to the reality in which farmers face a growing number and variety of extreme weather events.

Stéphanie Levasseur, vice-president at the Quebec union for agricultural producers (UPA), has seen farmers of all types suffer as of late. 

"It's been a crazy year so far," said Levasseur.

"We had frost early this spring when the apples were in bloom … We've been having big droughts and really hot weather up north in the Abitibi and Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean. So hay and other crops up there are scarce," she said.

Meanwhile, in the south of the province, vegetable fields have been flooded with rainwater and damaged by strong winds, preventing farmers from treating their crops for fungal diseases, she says.

Altogether, Levasseur says the crop losses leave farmers in a difficult spot with their insurance premiums going up each time their harvests are devastated. 

"If we keep having these insane weather events that we haven't seen before, year after year, the whole system is not going to be able to withstand the pressure," she said. 

In a statement, the FADQ said it is "sensitive" to farmers' situations and is "closely monitoring  the situation in every region of Quebec."

It also said it regularly adapts its crop insurance program, which covers yield reductions and certain specific costs attributable to weather conditions and uncontrollable natural phenomena. The program will be overhauled over the next few years as part of the FADQ's digital transformation, it said, with agricultural producers being consulted.

Two federal programs — AgriStability and Agrinvest — as well as the Agri-Québec program are also available to cover companies when production margins fluctuate, said the FADQ. 

"The FADQ provides agricultural businesses with income protection, insurance and financing products and services tailored to managing the risks inherent in this sector of activity," the FADQ told CBC.