The United States has stopped canola meal shipments from five Canadian plants at the border over concerns about potentially dangerous salmonella bacteria.

Prairie farmers are calling on the federal government to help sort out the situation before the backlog affects production and the price of the lucrative crop, which is used in animal feed.

"We are concerned that we are going to lose the ability to export our meal to the States," said Humphrey Banack, a canola grower from Round Hill, Alta., who is also president of the Wild Rose Agricultural Producers. "We end up with a burgeoning supply that is going to drive down canola prices."

Canola is a key cash crop on the Prairies, and is used primarily to make cooking oil. Canola meal is a lucrative byproduct. Last year's canola crop in Saskatchewan was worth $2 billion, while Alberta's crop was worth roughly half that.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has slapped import alerts on canola meal plants operated by Bunge Canada in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario, on Cargill LtD. in Saskatchewan and on Viterra in Manitoba.

The alerts put the plants on the USFDA Red List, which allows inspectors to detain shipments because they appear to contain salmonella, "a poisonous or deleterious substance" that could be harmful to health.

Banack said producers are wondering if the salmonella being found by the USDA in animal feed really poses a health risk and, if it does, why the Canadian government isn't doing more to deal with it.

Linda Morrison of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency said it is up to individual companies to satisfy U.S. import rules.

The CFIA has its own inspection program that requires facilities that sell feed in Canada to come up with a corrective action plan when salmonella is found, she said. But the agency won't say if that is happening at the plants identified by the USFDA.