VANCOUVER – With less than a month to the deadline for signing a new national farm policy, farm groups remain adamant that part of the new deal should be put on hold for another year.
“No farm organization in Canada is ready to meet their producers and say, ‘this is good,’ ” Quebec farm leader Laurent Pellerin said during the Canadian Federation of Agriculture meeting last week.
While the entire agriculture policy framework agreement designed to help Canadian farmers build a safe, reliable food industry shouldn’t be scrapped, Pellerin said the part dealing with business risk management issues like crop insurance and safety net programs cannot be presented yet.
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“Go ahead with the four other pillars of the APF, just not the fifth, and carry it on to the first of April next year,” said Pellerin, who is also president of the Union des Producteurs Agricoles.
There was continued concern during the national farm organization’s annual meeting that too many questions remain unanswered about how the new business risk management part of the framework will work and if it will be better for farmers than the existing program. Few farm leaders seemed willing to endorse the program.
Bill Mailloux of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture said he
couldn’t recommend an uncertain deal to the 41,000 members of his organization.
“I’m certainly not going to go out and try and sell a bad program to our producers,” said Mailloux.
“We’ve asked for improvements for the current programs. I’m certainly a fan of pushing hard for an extension. I’m not in a real good mood about accepting the fact they’ll put a basic program in place and say, ‘boys, trust us we’ll get the details right.’ I’m not a fan of that.”
Thad Trefiak, representing Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, warned against making small gains for bigger losses.
Penny Gambell of the British Columbia Agriculture Council said her group would like to see the minister delay the signing of the new farm program until there is more agreement from producers.
“Surely it’s more important to get it right. We don’t want to see the demand for ad hoc that there has been in the past. The only way that can be avoided is to get a program in place the farm community can support. We must take time to ensure we have a product that is sustainable,” she said.
Speaking via teleconference, federal agriculture minister Lyle Vanclief said he has heard the farm groups’ concerns, but has no plans to delay the April 1 deadline to sign a new agreement with producers.
“We have all worked hard in the past 18 months to articulate the Whitehorse vision. I have no intention of putting change on hold when we have come this far,” said Vanclief, referring to the federal and provincial agriculture ministers meeting in the Yukon where there was basic agreement for an agriculture policy.
There is a vast difference between what was agreed to in Whitehorse by governments and the agriculture industry and what is being proposed now, said CFA president Bob Friesen.
“We thought the entire thing was a partnership deal,” said Friesen, who added he was shocked to learn a few months ago that companion programs will not be included in the deal.
“What we see is the need to continue to have companion money,” said Friesen.
Vanclief offered a few changes to the way the new programs would be triggered, but Friesen said it amounted to tinkering, not real solutions to the impasse.
“There is an easy way out of this logjam and that’s keep a sliver of companion money in the package and promise you won’t impose a program on farmers midstream, and we can probably negotiate the rest,” Friesen said.
Pellerin was less diplomatic. He told Vanclief he felt the minister was using farm groups.
“The train is moving forward. You are opening doors for us to make comments, but I have the impression the train is still moving forward and going in the direction that has already been chosen. That direction is not really agreeable to us.”
Terry Otto, an executive member of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, said he’s worried the federal agriculture minister will do an end run around agriculture groups during his two-week trip across Canada to sell the benefits of the program.
“He’s going to play the provincial ministers against one another and that’s the weak link we have because they’re going to cave. They’re going to sign onto this damn thing and we’re going to be stuck with something we don’t want.”
