Farm costs

I have farmed since 1950 and have seen many changes in the agriculture business.

I believe that agriculture in general has made many changes to improve production volumes and quality and many new varieties of crops for the betterment of food production.

I also believe that there are many added concerns and expenses for farmers now: improved varieties of crops, developed by plant breeders and universities, better fertilizer blends and application methods, many new chemicals for weed control, impressive machinery designed for specific jobs, fuel used to get the work done, and the cost of freighting the crop to market.

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Farmers have had to gain education and then do a great deal of experimenting with all these new machines and methods of farming, incurring added expense while doing so.

My concern is that I don’t feel the farmer is getting compensated for the overall cost of using the new technology in chemicals, plants, fuel, machinery, fertilizer, etc. The companies have many costs, as do the farmers, but the difference is that farmers have to pay the price to cover the companies’ expenses to operate but have no way to add to our income to cover our added expense and maintain a fair profit margin.

The changes in agriculture are all in the name of producing low-cost food for consumers.

I now read that farmers will have to report and clean up any spills of 10 litres of pesticide, 300 litres of pesticide solutions, or mixture of petroleum products, liquid fertilizers, paint, 500 litres of pregnant mare’s urine, milk, honey or other liquid animal product or 500 kilograms of solid manure.

Environmentalists tell the farmers that they are trying to protect the water systems. Cities, towns and industries can dump raw sewage into these same water systems without fines for polluting them but the farmer’s spills will have to be cleaned up at the farmer’s expense.

I feel farmers are not being treated equally or fairly.

I believe without some form of subsidy to farmers, it will not be long before farming is done by corporate farms owned by plant breeders, chemical companies, fertilizer companies, and fuel companies. They would then be in a position to show a substantial profit margin.

Governments and environmentalists should take a good look at what they are allowing to happen to the farming industry and hopefully make some changes to help the farmer make a fair return for this work and expense.