‘Farming is a poker game’: Lack of moisture concerns farmers as harvest begins

Manitoba farmers are grappling with some of the most widespread drought in recent history. CTV’s Jeff Keele reports.

It has been a challenging summer for farmer Thorsten Stanze. Like many others, his Manitoba crops have been struggling.

“It’s been dry,” he said. “It’s a little drier than normal and the crops are very short.”

Stanze, who harvests oats, wheat, and canola in southern Manitoba, is starting to see the impact a dry summer is having on his crops.

“We’ve never had it before where you have ripe oats on top and green stem or leaves on the bottom,” he said while going through his crop. “When you have oats with green in the stem, it’s very hard to combine.”

The lack of moisture is being blamed for a very short crop – below average for what it normally should be at this time of year.

Stanze says the crop that he has harvested so far is smaller than what he is used to.

“This year, the cards are against us,” he said. “The yields are not great. They are little bit under par, but not great.”

Doug Martin, who farms wheat, corn, and soybeans north of Winnipeg in East Selkirk is also seeing the effects of dry weather on his crops.

“This corn crop, normally at this time of year, would be six to seven feet high, but this year it’s very short,” said Martin, who is also a member of the Manitoba Crop Alliance.

For May, June and July, Martin estimates that his crops received under two inches during that entire period.

“We’ve just seemed to miss it this year,” he said. “That’s part of farming as you just never know when it could rain. It’s unusual for us to miss these rains. Normally, we are too wet.”

But not all is lost for Martin.

While there is nothing he can do to salvage his wheat crop, he says recent rains could help his corn and soybeans.

“They are harvested much later,” he said. “Like corn, you don’t really start harvest until the middle of October, so you could see here the corn is still green and still filling, so there is potential for this rain to still help.”

Canola tariffs

It’s not just hot and dry weather throughout the summer that has had an impact on farmers this year, but some say China’s recent canola tariff will have significant effects on their bottom line.

Last week, China slapped a nearly 76 per cent tariff on imports of Canadian canola.

China, which sources nearly all its supplies of the product from Canada, announced preliminary anti-dumping duties on canola imports, escalating a year-long trade dispute that began with Ottawa’s tariffs on Chinese EV imports last August.

The new tariffs are set at 75.8 per cent.

“What it will do is have a depressing effect on not only the price, but the marketability later on when production is in the bin for farmers to sell,” said Rick White, the President and CEO of the Canadian Canola Growers Association. “It’s not a good situation for them.”

Canola seed production generated $12.9 billion in 2024, making it the most valuable field crop in the country.

China is the largest export market for Canadian canola seed. According to the Government of Canada, it represents 67 per cent of total canola seed exports, totalling 5.9 million tonnes in 2024, worth approximately $4 billion.

“Nobody has a magic fix for this issue,” he said. “We are convinced this is not an anti-dumping issue. We have contributed data that shows otherwise. China rejects that.”

“Really what this is, is a political problem. I think this is where the solution lies,” said White.”

Stanze, who produces around 2,000 metric tonnes of canola each year, is worried, as the latest duty is bringing forth a ton of uncertainty.

“Most farms have about 25-30 per cent canola in their rotation and it’s a big money maker normally,” he said. “But if you lose that market, it’s very bad.”

If nothing changes, Stanze says he will reduce the percentage of canola he’ll produce next year.

“The input costs are skyrocketing right now,” he said. “We bought some fertilizer and that has probably increased 25 per cent on the input side and 25 per cent decrease on the product side. That bites.”

He added that the farming industry is a sizeable contributor to Canada’s GDP, including canola.

“I think it’s just as important as the steel workers and automobile workers in Ontario.”