N.B. maple syrup producer wins appeal against Quebec quotas
Mike Ouellette
Judge says The Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers tried to enforce its quotas outside its jurisdiction
FREDERICTON, N.B.—A New Brunswick maple syrup processor has won an appeal in his dispute with the marketing federation that controls syrup production in Quebec.
The New Brunswick Court of Appeal says in a written decision that limits set by the Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers on the amount of sap and syrup Etienne St-Pierre can buy don’t apply in the East Coast province.
The appeal decision upholds an earlier decision by the Court of Queen’s Bench in Fredericton, which said the attempt to apply quotas to St-Pierre’s company in Kedgwick, N.B., didn’t apply.
The Quebec injunction was originally issued by the Quebec Agricultural Marketing Board after the federation filed a complaint against St-Pierre in 2007.
But the New Brunswick courts have refused to accept the board’s decision and its ratification by a Quebec court as having jurisdiction in the province.
Justice Alexandre Deschenes wrote that the Court of Appeal agreed with earlier rulings that the federation was trying to extend Quebec regulations into a separate jurisdiction.
He also agreed that since the injunction against St-Pierre was a temporary order and since the Quebec board was still reviewing its own jurisdiction it wasn’t logical to enforce an injunction that might not last.
