Joseph Schow, the minister of jobs, economy, trade and immigration
The new provincial budget missed an opportunity to invest in rural Alberta on multiple fronts, the NDP’s agriculture and irrigation critic told The Macleod Gazette recently.
Within a sweeping indictment of the budget, Heather Sweet singled out job creation and support for farmers as two areas needing more attention.
She said “strong, vibrant rural communities” should be a major goal of government spending, helping convince rural and small-town Albertans to stay put rather than move away.
“This budget could have been an opportunity to invest in the people of rural Alberta and it was a failure,” added Sweet, the member for Edmonton-Manning.
Joseph Schow, the minister of jobs, economy, trade and immigration, responded in a prepared statement: “It’s clear the NDP did not read the budget because if they did, they would know we are increasing the Investment and Growth Fund, which has already brought more than $1 billion of capital investment to Alberta.”
Schow pointed to “massive projects” as IGF beneficiaries, among them the expansion of Structural Truss Systems and Forma Steel in Fort Macleod.
The sister companies in 2023 received close to $1 million towards a new facility that allows the potential doubling of production. It began operation last year and was earlier projected to create 33 permanent jobs.
If passed, the new budget nearly doubles the IGF to $28 million in 2026-’27 from $15 million last year. Designed to push late-stage, private-sector projects across the finish line, grants range from $500,000 to $10 million.
Schow, the UCP member for Cardston-Siksika, also said pro-business taxation is helping establish Alberta as the nation’s leader in job creation, having added 100,000 full-time positions in the past 12 months.
“While the NDP promises to hike (the rate) by almost 38 per cent, we have kept (corporate taxes) the lowest in Canada, driving more investment to Alberta and creating jobs for families who call our province home,” Schow said.
The premier and cabinet ministers have defended the province’s forecast consecutive deficits as necessary because of economic uncertainty, dramatic Alberta population growth and projected drops in resource revenue. Deficits of $9.4 billion, $7.6 billion and $6.9 billion are on the books in the new budget.
But in a budget the UCP tags as “focused on what matters,” not all job creation gets a boost.
A budget line for small business and economic development holds steady at $20 million a year and is set to stay there through 2028-’29. A grant program within the category dips to around $9 million from $9.8 million.
Called the Northern and Regional Economic Development program, it cost-shares eligible projects with grants of between $10,000 and $300,000. Successful applicants are municipalities, incorporated non-profits and Indigenous communities.
The more remote a community is in Alberta, the more likely it is to struggle to maintain its population, Statistics Canada data suggest.
A growth surge — about 600,000 people between 2021 and 2025 that’s launched Alberta’s population past five million — has the province struggling to keep up with demands on health, education and other services.
Around 85 per cent of provincial growth typically goes to greater Edmonton and Calgary. Corridor communities between the two cities usually hold their own or grow at reasonable rates.
Ponoka County, with a southern border about 30 km north of Red Deer, was home to about 9,800 people in 2016. A decade later, the province estimates the population at more than 10,600.
Cypress County in the deep south, meanwhile, has seen a recent bump to an estimated 7,837 people, an increase of about 2.3 per cent since 2016.
But in Northern Sunrise County, a sprawling Peace Country municipality four times the size of Prince Edward Island, the population has dropped 11 per cent to around 1,700 people over the same period.
A program geared for municipalities like Northern Sunrise expires in the new budget. Administered by the Department of Agriculture and Irrigation, the Small Community Opportunity Program was worth $6 million over two years.
SCOP approvals went to communities of fewer than 20,000 people at least 100 km from centres with 25,000 people or more.
In a 300-word statement, the agriculture ministry’s press secretary highlighted continued funding of $2.5 million annually for agriculture society infrastructure.
Calling ag societies “essential to rural communities,” Callum Reid also mentioned one-time operational injections totalling about $7.5 million last year for the big seven regional societies to address financial difficulties.
Ag societies get $11.5 million in operating cash annually, divided between the big seven — Camrose, Grande Prairie, Lethbridge, Lloydminster, Medicine Hat, Olds and Red Deer — and the 285 smaller or primary ones.
Although the operational funding has remained the same since 2017, the province added a capital component of $2.5 million annually in 2023. The Agricultural Societies Infrastructure Revitalization Program has never been increased.
So far it’s put $7.5 million towards 106 ag society projects “for major repairs and renovations to commercial kitchens, roofing, dressing rooms and more, in facilities like community halls, arenas and rodeo grounds,” Reid said.
Reid also mentioned projects supported through Alberta’s Agri-Processing Investment Tax Credit program, which helps attract large-scale investment in value-added agriculture and food processing.
As of Feb. 17, 19 corporations and three partnerships had applied to the credit for projects worth about $1.85 billion in new investment.
“Our tax credit program provides the right conditions for food and ag processors to invest in our province, grow their business and create more jobs for Albertans,” said Reid’s statement.
Sweet said the tax credit, launched in the 2023-’24 budget, should go up.
“Now would be the time to do it, when we’re trying to diversify our economy,” she said.
The program offers a 12 per cent non-refundable tax credit to corporations investing $10 million or more to build or expand agri-processing facilities.
The coming fiscal year will see the first major hit to the provincial coffers caused by the credit, as claims start coming in. Budget tables put the lost revenue at about $43 million.
Reid from the ministry concluded: “Budget 2026 reflects Alberta’s continued commitment to our province’s farmers, ranchers and everyone else working hard to put the best food on plates at home and across the world.”
