Agriculture minister Lyle Vanclief met with a business group last week that claims to be an increasingly relevant representative of farmers that brings a different message to politicians.
“One of the first things we said is that we are not asking for more money,” Canadian Federation of Independent Business senior vice-president Garth Whyte said in an interview after his 90-minute meeting with the agriculture minister Sept. 23.
But the CFIB did come with some demands.
It said the farm income crisis is hurting its members – including close to 4,000 farmers and 2,000 farm supply companies – and that the government should act.
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But it is not an issue that necessarily calls for more government money, Whyte said.
“We told him there are things you can do and it isn’t just giving out more money.”
Instead, CFIB members have identified government user fees, taxes and regulatory costs as major problems the government could reduce without spending more money.
Meet with minister
Whyte, along with federation agri-business analyst Robert Meijer, met with Vanclief for the first time in part to convince him that the CFIB is an agricultural and rural voice.
More than half of its 95,000 members are rural-based businesses, 2,300 of them in Western Canada – including an estimated 1,600 farm operators.
Whyte said the group is a legitimate representative of farm and rural members because all its policies are based on membership surveys.
Members have found the Agricultural Income Disaster Assistance program too complex. And they believe the Net Income Stabilization Account program could be improved.
More than 62 percent of CFIB members who responded to a survey said their NISA accounts are not large enough to allow them to “withstand downturns.”
Capital gains exemption
He said members consider the most important tax issue to be maintenance of the $500,000 lifetime capital gains exemption for farmers. The federation is running a fax campaign to convince Ottawa to ignore labor and big business groups that suggest an erosion of the exemption.
“There would be a huge political price to pay if the government did that,” he said.
“I think they would not risk it.”
Meanwhile, the largest priorities for CFIB members are taxes, government debt reduction, rising input costs and government bureaucracy and regulations.
“These are things the government can do without increasing their budget,” Whyte said.
The group insists farmers should have more marketing choices, including an end to the Canadian Wheat Board wheat and barley export monopoly.
