State Control of Canadian Grain Movement
OTTAWA - Mar 7/14 - SNS -- The Canadian government is intervening directly in grain transportation, mandating that Canada's two national railways haul a minimum of one million metric tons (MT) of grain per week.
Canadian National Railway Company and Canadian Pacific Railway Company have been given four weeks to comply or face fines of up to $100,000 per day.
In a joint announcement, Transport Minister Lisa Raitt and Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said the Order in Council passed by the federal Cabinet also requires the railways to report to the Minister of Transport on weekly shipments, implicitly transferring control of grain transportation to the federal government.
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz added that legislation will be introduced in Parliament to create additional "measures to ensure Canada maintains a world-class logistics system that gets agricultural products to market more efficiently."
The order more than doubles the volume of grain currently being moved, but does not address the overall logistics of export grain movement. This creates the risk of congestion in rail yards servicing port terminals unless what is loaded into railcars matches up with what is needed to load vessels.
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