It could have been a demonstration of respect for farmers, the celebration of an institution sworn to protect farmers, an acknowledgement that farm reality happens outside the Nepean sandstone walls and marble hallways of the national and provincial capitals.
It would have been great to see it announced at a farm conference this winter, or in Brandon, Red Deer or Saskatoon, which is where aggies congregate.
Instead, the news that the federal agriculture minister had appointed a new chief commissioner for the Canadian Grain Commission came out in the dead of the farmer’s night — seeding time — and in the form of a news release that made it seem like little more than the appointment of a federal bureaucrat.
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That provoked the predictably celebratory press releases by numerous farm and agricultural organizations and companies. It also provoked skeptical and pointed questioning by our columnist, Kevin Hursh, who was perplexed by what he saw as a lack of grain industry experience with the new chief commissioner. If he had been a well-known farm leader, it might have been different, but that’s not the situation.
None of how this appointment was rolled out by the government was fair to David Hunt, the new head of the grain commission. From what I’ve heard from a number of people within Manitoba’s farm and agriculture industry, Hunt is highly competent, manages to bring people together within fractious organizations (the CGC fits that description) and has gained the trust of both those who have employed him and those who have worked for him.
If you’d like to know a little bit more about him, right from the horse’s mouth, go to our website to see a four-minute interview in which I gave him a chance to introduce himself and talk about his new role serving farmers across Canada.
To me, that’s how you should make an announcement of the appointment of somebody vital to farmers’ interests, especially if he isn’t well known outside Manitoba. The worst thing for government authorities and agencies to do, if they care about building trust with the people they serve, is to seem to put government priorities first. Members of Parliament have to face questions about whether they are representing their constituents to Ottawa or representing Ottawa to their constituents.
Ministers of agriculture are, of course, members of the government. They have to care about general government priorities. But agriculture ministers have a specific role with a specific population, which means they need to be more attuned to those people than most ministers.
I don’t know if Hunt wanted a more public trotting out and debut. Probably not. When I met him, he seemed reassuringly unpretentious and down to earth, probably eager to get on with the demands of the job and not looking to stand in the spotlight.
However, I think it would have been good for farmers to get the news and introduction in a more farmer-friendly manner. That would have helped to avoid some of the predictable skepticism about “who is he really working for?” that arises when people feel ignored in the process.
Contact ed.white@producer.com
