Eastern Ontario egg producer Laurent Souligny looks at the turmoil inside the Canadian Egg Marketing Agency and sees a glass three-quarters full.
“We have spent a year trying to kill little fires and now it is time to start to work on building the system,” said the newly elected chair of CEMA. “I think we are going in the right direction. I think there is the will.”
The man he replaced as CEMA chair last week, Quebec producer FŽlix Destrijker, looks at the same situation and sees a glass half empty.
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In his final annual report to the CEMA board March 22, the retiring chair said the agency’s recent record is a contradiction. He said the 28-year-old supply management program is in the worst crisis of its existence.
On the positive side, the Northwest Territories became a member last year, sales are up, Canadian eggs have been recognized as the safest in the world and nutrition tests are confirming eggs to be an essential and healthy part of the daily diet.
On the negative side, the system is on the verge of collapse as tensions between provinces grow, Manitoba openly defies a CEMA quota order, agreements are reached and then broken, and relations between provinces are so bad the agency has been in conflict-resolution counseling for a year. It has not been working.
And for the first time, internal disagreements have meant the National Farm Products Council has refused to approve CEMA’s latest controversial national quota allocation proposal.
Quota not approved
It means the national egg marketing system has been working for more than a month without sanctioned quota controls. Provinces have been sticking to previous production levels but could begin to increase their flocks if a new production-control rules are not approved soon.
“CEMA is without a quota order for the first time in its history,” Destrijker said in his final address as chair.
“This is extremely serious. The ability to determine and enforce quota is the very foundation upon which supply management is built. That foundation has been seriously cracked. We must find out how to repair it.”
He blamed provincial government demands, saying, “we must do everything within our power to stop interprovincial bickering and interprovincial competition. We must say no when we are enticed to become spokespersons for our provincial governments.”
The former CEMA chair also blamed agency members for their performance. He begged directors “to do everything possible to reduce tensions. Let’s put an end to threats. Let’s be honest in what it is we need. Let’s stop posturing … He told directors it is up to them to save the system created by their ancestors.
“If we don’t find the answers we need, then we will be at fault,” he said. “We will be the cause of our own ruin and that is a legacy I don’t want to leave to my children.”
