Following a suite of policy changes coming this summer to help BC’s hurting wine industry, the province has announced an extra $70 million dollars to help replant and strengthen fruit orchards and vineyards.
Speaking at a wine industry conference in Penticton Wednesday, Minister of Agriculture and Food Pam Alexis announced the increased funding, with a focus on climate resilient varietals of grapes, fruit and cherries.
She was later joined by Premier David Eby, who video conferenced in to tell the more than 250 attendees that the province has their back.
“We’re with you, we’ll stay with you and let’s get planning,” Eby added.
“The farmers of British Columbia are so critical to our province, the security of our food. We see the challenges internationally around food security, and that’s going to affect us.”
The premier added that the $70 million replanting program should hopefully “go a long way” in getting growers of fruits across the province back on their feet.
Boundary-Similkameen MLA Roly Russell spoke on the suite of policy changes coming for the summer season, including more support for tours that allow people to sit and enjoy a glass of wine while on a tour, permits allowing sales for more places on site, more flexibility on sampling, and selling products in picnic areas.
“All of this while making it clear that it’s okay to bring your glass of wine from one service area to the other,” he said to the room, followed by a round of applause
“We recognize the $3.75 billion contribution, we recognize those 14,000 jobs, we recognize how deeply embedded in this part of the world the industry is and how important it is,” he said.
The government is also establishing a B.C. wine-grape sector task force to develop a research and varietal road map for the local industry. The task force will run for two years and provide practical recommendations to producers and the industry about how to remain profitable and resilient.
Industry leaders spoke to Castanet News on the importance of support to not only wine industry members but the province as a whole.
“We know that any investment they make will come back multiple fold. I mean, we’re a $3.7 billion industry. So it’s not just about wine. It’s about as I say, wine, tourism and restaurants and everyone across the province takes advantage of our industry, if not by enjoying it in a glass, but certainly by the impact that we have on the province,” Miles Proden, president of Wine Growers BC said.
Dan Paszkowski, the president of Wine Growers Canada said the tourism that’s developed around the valley in terms of resorts, golf courses, and UBC is centred around the wine industry.
“So the value added contribution of the wine industry to Kelowna to Penticton to the entire Okanagan Valley revolves around the wine and grape industry to a very large extent. And it hasn’t even come close to its full its full potential,” he added.
“So if we can grow back the industry, that’s going to contribute to the British Columbia economy and contribute to the well being of all British Columbians and all Canadians.
He said being representative at the national level, he’s taking a cue from the provinces in terms of engaging discussions with the federal government to address issues related to income stabilization, purchasing of grapes and the replant of the crops in the Okanagan over the next couple of couple of years
It was announced on Saturday the government would cap the excise duty increase from 4.7 per cent down to two per cent.
The wine industry insight conference was hosted by Wine Growers British Columbia with the Wine Grape Council, BC Wine Grape Growers, and also the BC Wine Institute.
They all agree there is still much more to be done to help growers and producers heading forward, as they look at years of rebuilding.
Chris Wyse, the president of Burrowing Owl Winery in the South Okanagan, said there are a lot of unknowns still.
“We’re all concerned. We hope we’ll get through it. There’s lots of ideas on the table how we’ll handle the harvest coming up, some wineries will be affected more than others. The frost probably won’t be universal,” he said.
“But I think right now we’re working together, I think we’re pulling together as an industry, we want to support each other. And make sure that as a BC wine region, we stay strong.”
Proden added that any funding announcement is just the start of the process.
“This isn’t money that’s a gift. There needs to be some thoughtful work put behind where does that money go in replacing what grape and where. It’s just not a simple matter of replacing what was damaged, we need to be thoughtful and making sure the right grape is placed in the right place,” he said.
“We’ve got the knowledge and the resiliency and the skill in our vineyard and wine industry to do that, but certainly, this will be a huge step and the first down the road.”
The new investment in a provincial replant program is in addition to the crop insurance and AgriStability income-protection programs the federal and provincial governments operate to support farmers who experience crop losses and income declines.
ORIGINAL: 1:30 p.m.
The British Columbia government says farmers will get an extra $70 million to replant and strengthen fruit orchards and vineyards after two years of weather-related disasters.
Premier David Eby says the funding will boost the province’s existing $15 million Perennial Crop Renewal Program, launched last spring to help more than 200 farmers replace diseased and unproductive plants.
Speaking at a wine industry conference in Penticton, Eby says the new funding will help about 1,000 more producers revitalize their farms.
B.C.’s wine grape growers say a cold snap in January destroyed up to 99 per cent of the province’s harvest, a devastating blow that followed another crippling deep freeze in 2022 and wildfire smoke damage in 2021.
Okanagan fruit growers say they were also hit hard by the January cold spell that sent temperatures in Kelowna plunging to -27 C, inflicting 90 per cent losses for stone fruits.
Eby says the government will also establish a B.C. wine grape sector task force to develop plans to help producers stay profitable and resilient as they face climate change.
More to come…
Photo: The Canadian Press
B.C. Premier David Eby speaks during a news conference in Vancouver on Jan. 9, 2024. The British Columbia government says hard-hit fruit farmers and grape growers will get an extra $70 million in supports to replant and strengthen orchards and vineyards after two years of weather-related disasters. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ethan Cairns
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
