Beef producers across Alberta are being asked to fill out a survey in an effort to better understand how the cattle industry can co-exist with wildlife, while reducing economic impacts.

Alberta Beef Producers has teamed up with the Miistakis Institute to better understand the issue, so impacts such as animal or feed loss, property damage and the costs of damage prevention and producer management of dealing with wildlife can be addressed on a regional and provincial scale, while maintaining a healthy wildlife population.

ABP is looking for 2,000 producers to fill out the survey.

The results will be reviewed by Miistakis and combined with scientific and grey literature on this issue and compensation program data from Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development and Agriculture Financial Services Cooperation to form a report, which takes in several perspectives.

Alberta Beef Producers say the ultimate goal is to use the data to help create an environment between producers and others that:

• Recognizes producers as stewards of the land, who bear significant costs supporting wildlife.
• Foster a cooperative approach to wildlife management.
• Recognize producers’ knowledge of reasonable levels of local wildlife populations.
• Develop fair and sensible methods for measuring losses to wildlife.
• Acknowledge the uneven distribution of wildlife costs among producers and throughout society.
• Pursue creative mechanisms such as Ecological Goods and Services programs for financing stewardship and realistic loss compensation.

Alberta has 20,000 farms with over 5.5 million cattle sharing land with native wildlife species.

The survey is open until March 5th.

To fill out the survey click here.

Hard copies can also by contacting the Alberta Beef Producers directly at reception@albertabeef.org or 403-275-4400.