High costs haunt Canadian ornamental pumpkin farm
"We're not impacted by tariffs but the trade issues are still ratcheting up costs for us across the board," said farm co-owner Patrick Butters.
Canadian ornamental pumpkin farmers face mounting costs that threaten their ability to compete in the market, according to a report by Global News. Second-generation farmers in St. Thomas, Ontario, have specialized in growing mini orange pumpkins and tiny green gourds for the Thanksgiving and Halloween seasons. However, the price of transporting these seasonal crops to stores across Canada and the United States has surged, leaving farmers with little room to raise prices.
Patrick Butters, co-owner of Butters Farms, noted a 30% increase in trucking rates and a 20% rise in packaging costs. Butters Farms, with its 2,200 hectares of land, grows a variety of crops including ornamental pumpkins, soybeans, wheat, and corn. While ornamental crops make up only 10% of the farm's acreage, they generate about half of its revenue.
Farmers across Canada are facing similar challenges, with Keith Currie, president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, highlighting the skyrocketing costs of machinery and diesel. These rising expenses have farmers focusing on controlling variables such as pre-buying inputs, locking in future crop prices, and diversifying their crops.
The uncertainty in the market leaves farmers like the Butters brothers "buying their seed in the winter and planting their crop in the spring with the hope that relationships they've developed with their customer base for decades can continue."
Written by urgent.news from Global News's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
