Expanded access to the Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA)

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced expanded eligibility criteria for the Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) for the many small businesses and owners who qualify.

The changes to the CEBA will provide more Canadian small businesses access to interest-free loans to help them cover their operating costs as revenues decline as a result of the pandemic.

This program is now available to businesses in which the sole proprietor draws income directly from the business, businesses that depend on contract workers, and family businesses that pay their employees through dividends instead of payroll.

For further information, click here

Hay Insurance: Operation harvest 2020

For many years, the collective hay crop insurance program has been raising question from farmers. Last year, we undertook a major effort to collect data from insured farmers to have more resources at our disposal in representing farmers’ interests with the Financière Agricole du Québec (FADQ).

The data collected last year will be used as a basis to monitor the 2020 hay file this year.

For the time being, we have the following recommendations:

• If you have been struck by winter freeze, drought, or excess water, please take notes, calculate your losses, take photos, and keep your invoices on file.
• If you observe that your hay fields are affected, contact your FADQ advisor to have a notice of damage completed. Although the notice is not required for you to receive compensation under the group component, declaring your damages helps highlight a problem that is insurable by the FADQ.

We may call upon you for data collection purposes.

Bird scaring in MRC de Pontiac

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced us to suspend this year’s wild goose scaring service in the MRC de Pontiac. We apologize for the inconvenience to affected farmers. If you have any questions or require further information, please do not hesitate to contact Xavier Lagueux, the regional Federation land-use planning advisor, by email at xlagueux@upa.qc.ca or by phone at 514-792-8388. We thank you for your understanding in this matter.

Mental health

Grieving

Learning how to grieve is the topic of the ninth video from Écoute agricole Laurentides (in French). We all need to grieve various things over the course of our lives, such as losing a loved one, losing a business, going through a separation, etc. Do you know the five steps of a healthy mourning process?

Mental health at issue in L'Éveil agricole

Two articles on mental health appeared in the latest edition of the L’Éveil Agricole newspaper. You can read them (in French) by clicking on the links below.

Violence conjugale en milieu agricole: «Protège-toi, écoute ta voix!»

Écoute agricole Laurentides multiplie ses services