NORTH BATTLEFORD, Sask. – A Conservative government would shake up the federal agriculture department, ending almost two decades of lumping agriculture policy with agribusiness, the party agriculture critic says.
“I think the department should be de-coupled,” Gerry Ritz, incumbent MP and candidate in the Battleford-Lloyd-minster riding said June 5.
“Too much of the attention and too much of the money goes to the agrifood side of it. I think there should be a department of agriculture with a focus on farmers. Agrifood could go to industry or somewhere else. There will always be overlap but I think the department has lost its focus.”
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It is not an idea found in the party’s election platform, announced the same day in Toronto. Ritz said it is what he would advocate within government.
The official platform promises farmers richer safety nets if needed, support for the goals of supply management and a move to a voluntary Canadian Wheat Board.
But there was scant mention of agriculture in the 47-page document and no detail on how goals would be met or how much money might be needed.
Ritz said it was just “broad brush strokes” with detail to follow.
“A Conservative government led by Stephen Harper will support the use of safety net programs to assist producers who are struggling against conditions outside their control,” said the platform released in Toronto.
“We will provide enhanced support to agriculture and the agrifood industry while acting consistently with our international trading obligations.”
The party promised to make sure dairy, poultry and egg sectors now protected by supply management “remain viable” and pledged support for “the goal of supply management to deliver a high quality product to consumers for a fair price with a reasonable return to the producer.”
The platform also promised to “give grain farmers the freedom to make their own marketing and transportation decisions.”
Ritz said the platform is promising the three pillars of supply management – border controls, production controls and cost-based price setting – will be defended and the party will push making the wheat board voluntary, but only after farmers are consulted about how and when to move.
But he said a key goal of a Conservative government would be to make sure federal money really gets to farmers.
“We really have to clean up the programs and make sure the money that is allocated to farmers really gets to farmers.”
He also vowed to change regulations that restrict access to pesticide and herbicide s and to review cost-recovery charges that undermine farmer competitiveness.
“Bottom line, we have to create a policy and a bureaucracy that is more farmer friendly,” said Ritz. “Much of the BSE money helped the industry rather than farmers. And I don’t disagree with the five-year commitment of the APF (agricultural policy framework) but the broad stroke is, and what I am hearing from farmers, is that much of it will end up on the agribusiness side.”
The department was expanded to include the agribusiness side of the industry in the 1980s under the Progressive Conservative government.
Ritz said it has served only to make farmers a cog in the food industry wheel, rather than the focus of the department.
“Our bottom line has to be to get more income at the farm gate. That’s where the industry begins.”
Last week, agriculture minister Bob Speller said the Conservatives should not be trusted in their claims of support for supply management, noting that they talk about supporting “the goals” of the system.
“Those are slippery words,” he said.
