HALIFAX, N.S. — Federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz is not considering a grand new agricultural policy vision as the Conservative government prepares for the final two years of its mandate.
Instead, it will be a continuation of the transformative changes he has overseen during his six years in office, the past two backed by a majority government.
“There’s always a lot of work to be done, but now a lot of it is institutional,” he said.
Prime minister Stephen Harper recently announced that Parliament will reconvene in the fall with a throne speech, a new session and a renewed agenda.
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However, Ritz said he wants the next two years to be a time of building on directions he has already started.
There are no signature goals such as ending the CWB monopoly. Instead, he plans to make incremental progress.
“The wheat board is sort of a historical marker,” said Ritz.
“I guess I would like to be known over the last couple of years of this mandate as still having our shoulder to the wheel, still moving forward on a number of different fronts. Agriculture is not static. There’s still a fair amount of work to do.”
The past two years have also seen the beginning of Canadian Grain Commission reform, aggressive trade promotion, a refocusing of research from government to private-led priorities and a change in the Agriculture Canada mandate to become more industry friendly and less a source of subsidy financing and government direction.
Ritz led a federal-provincial agreement last year to launch a new five-year agricultural policy framework that reduces farm safety net coverage and emphasizes innovation and industry-led research. Growing Forward 2 launched April 1.
Incremental improvements planned by Ritz include:
- An increase in value-added production across Canada, aimed at supplying markets with higher-value products. “It’s a missed opportunity trying to sell the Japanese a 10-ounce New York steak rather than sell them five two-ounce cuts packaged in a certain way that they want,” he said. “That’s what they’re asking for and we have to start thinking in terms of supplying what they want and not what we have.”
- Continuing the priority on trade deals, including completing a European agreement and putting more resources into negotiating a Canada-Japan deal and an agreement with Pacific Rim countries through the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks.
- Implementing the Safe Food for Canadians Act with rules and regulations that assure both domestic and foreign customers of the quality and safety of Canadian food.
- Emphasizing results rather than processes in policy.
“We continue to work with industry on results-based outcomes whether it’s research or the trade agenda or regulatory regimes,” he said. “It’s the results we’re focused on at this point.”
He said results-based policy also extends to his re-organization and trimming of Agriculture Canada.
It is “recalibrating what Agriculture Canada does,” he said. “Are we still working in a way that is beneficial to the industry and not detrimental to the industry in some ways?”
Ritz said a key will be to make sure government regulations do not unnecessarily impede business. An Agri-Innovation council chaired by former Canadian Cattlemen’s Association president Travis Toews and Agriculture Canada deputy minister Suzanne Vinet aims to do that.
“It is looking at ways to make government work at the speed of commerce to make sure we are not holding them back in any way,” he said.
