While prairie farmers were crisscrossing their fields with spray coupes, the House of Commons environment committee was issuing a report supporting sharp cuts to pesticide use in Canada.
Part of the report criticizes the cosmetic use of chemicals, such as controlling dandelions in lawns, but the document also affects farmers.
Those ramifications are not lost on Derek McLaren, who grows potatoes near Carberry, Man., for the french fry industry.
McLaren believes legislators in Eastern Canada are out of touch with the needs of prairie growers.
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McLaren said he is careful about how much chemical he applies to his fields. But Colorado potato beetles and the late blight fungus could wipe out his crop if pesticides were not available.
“There won’t be any potato farms left if we don’t use fungicides.”
Soon after the release of the environment committee’s report, the Canadian Association of Agri-Retailers issued a news release voicing its dismay.
“We were shocked by a number of the statements that were in this report,” said association president Richard Rhodes.
“Some of the comments that are in there need to be questioned.”
Rhodes said the report is inaccurate and could foster public skepticism and fear about the way food is produced.
He described Canada’s regulatory system for food production as one of the most rigorous in the world.
Included in the environment committee’s report were recommendations to change the way the Pest Management Regulatory Agency operates.
The committee wants health and the environment to remain paramount over agriculture in assessing chemicals for use in Canada.
Rhodes suggested that removing pesticide use from commercial farming would cause yield losses of 40 percent.
Boost for organics
But Neil Strayer, an organic grower from Drinkwater, Sask., was encouraged by the report’s attention to the organics industry.
The environment committee recommended more federal support to help the industry grow. That would include funds for research and market development as well as incentives such as tax breaks to promote organic farming.
“We don’t have to have a war on nature to come up with an abundance of food,” said Strayer, who is also president of Growers International Organic Sales Inc.
“We’ve proven in spades that food can be produced efficiently using organics.”
Training in organic production at the university and provincial extension levels is lacking. That is one of the areas where Strayer would like to see more government support.
While he hopes the report leads to policy changes in Ottawa, he worries that it will become nothing more than rhetoric.
“I hate to be too cynical, but we’ve heard this before. This isn’t the first time.”
Don Dewar, president of Keystone Agricultural Producers, said Canada’s food already has been proven safe with current farming practices.
He wonders whether the committee considered the benefits of pesticides, such as combating bacteria that can be harmful to consumers. And he wonders what the basis was for the committee’s strong push toward pesticide reduction.
“Even though we’ve been using more pesticides, I think we’ve also been using safer pesticides, in later years,” said Dewar.
“If there’s no trace of it in the food, then what is the concern?”
