Producers need a clear signal from government on the funding and continuity of on-farm food safety programs in the new version of the federal agriculture policy framework, say Canadian Federation of Agriculture members.
During interviews at the CFA’s semi-annual meeting in Saskatoon July 24-27, food safety committee chairs William Versteeg and Betty Jean Crews say programs cannot be put on hold while government sorts out its new direction.
They explained how many human resources, programs and projects are already in place, citing researchers already contracted or farmers implementing farm traceability systems as examples.
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“It’s a really important file and if you have that hiccup in there, you lose people and lose momentum,” Versteeg said.
Project leaders need to know whether there will be funding to continue the work into the new year.
“Right now we have no idea of what the food safety program will look like or whether it will be funded. We can’t overextend ourselves and carry on programming without knowing the commitment and the size of the commitment,” said Versteeg.
Also critical to the program’s success is continuing to have the industry lead its development through groups like the Canada on-farm food safety working group.
“These are representatives from industry designing parameters that industry can live with,” said Crews, who grows grains, oilseeds and fruit on her Ontario farm.
A government proposal to annex that program into Agriculture Canada is causing concern.
“We are losing the ability to have programs that affect farmers be designed by farmers and their organizations,” said Versteeg, a dairy farmer in Nova Scotia.
He said producer led and driven programs have more credibility among farmers and offer a better chance of success than those created by civil servants.
“You won’t get it by farmers that this is something they should be doing,” Versteeg said.
Crews said any future enhancements to the program standards would be an even tougher sell among producers.
“If they’re going to exceed those goals, it’s only going to happen when industry is leading,” she said.
Crews said farmers cannot be buried under any more paperwork in carrying out food safety initiatives.
“With food safety, a lot of what we are doing is not making food safer but proving that traceability, documentation of due diligence of what we’re doing now,” she said.
Versteeg said the need for continued funding comes from dealing with such regulatory details.
“We’re lobbying for money to help with the regulatory regime, not to produce safe food, but to pay for all the documentation around that that proves we are doing a good job,” he said.
