The New Democratic Party’s agricultural platform for the Oct. 14 election is a combination of support for organic agriculture, marketing boards and labelling of genetically modified food.
The NDP promises to add more food inspectors, legislate the Canadian Wheat Board as the monopoly marketer of wheat and barley and emphasize co-operative development. 
“We need to redress the imbalances of economic power between producers and agribusiness corporations including limiting meat packers’ ownership of cattle by adding new provisions to the Competition Act, support the development of more producer-run co-operatives to act as a counterweight to the power of the multinational agribusiness giants and to encourage more value-added processing and jobs in Canada,” Ontario MP Tony Martin said Sept. 29.
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During a nationally broadcast debate on agriculture sponsored in Ottawa by the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, Martin said farmers reject the Liberal carbon tax proposal in favour of a system of capping emissions and allowing a trading system for those unable to meet the targets.
Under that system, farmers would be able to sell their environmental contributions for cash on a carbon market.
Martin said farmers are also worried about the Conservative government undermining domestic marketing systems at World Trade Organization talks.
“They want a government that will stand up for them at trade talks with other countries,” Martin said.
“They want supply management and the wheat board to be protected.”
In the party platform released in Toronto Sept.28 by leader Jack Layton, the NDP said it would work to create farm income stabilization programs that meet international trade obligations but still are targeted at specific commodities and are “focused on the family farms that need the most help.”
The NDP promised to require GM labelling as part of its food safety measures. It also promised to increase food inspection “to ensure the food you buy in the store is safe to eat.” The party did not indicate how much extra it would spend on food inspection.
The platform said an NDP government would increase the number of inspectors at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and improve administrative support.
The inspectors’ union has complained that Conservative policies mean they are spending more time overseeing reports of company inspections and less time on line inspections.
The Conservatives insist that the deepest cuts in food inspection came during the Liberal governments of the 1990s when they were trying to eliminate a the deficit. Hundreds of millions of dollars were cut and hundreds of staff positions eliminated.
They say they have added $113 million to the agency budget and hired 200 more inspectors.
The Liberals note that the NDP promises new inspectors but does not include the cost in its proposed budget.
The NDP in its platform also promised it would promote organic agriculture, ban the use of terminator seed, protect the farmer right to save seed for replanting and “improve access to farm safety net funding for natural disasters and poor markets, particularly for small farmers.”
