Officials from the grain and rail transportation sectors will be at Wednesday’s roundtable discussion, hosted by federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau and Lawrence MacAulay, federal Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food. Grain transportation was a critical issue for farmers last winter when producers said shipping delays and backlogs following what had been in many cases an excellent harvest were resulting in huge financial losses for them. It includes financial penalties for failure to deliver promised rail cars for grain shipments on time. Rival Canadian National Railway Co. announced a similar order of 1,000 hopper cars in May, also from National Steel Car. Both companies said their orders were facilitated by federal government changes that encourage railways to make investments to avert service disruptions.

Source: National Post September 12, 2018 14:15 UTC