The Canadian Human Rights Commission won’t be following up on a complaint by some organic farmers that the Canadian Wheat Board violates their human rights.
“I see this more as a business or economic issue, not a human rights issue,” said Marlene Chambers of the commission’s Prairie office in Winnipeg.
The Organic Special Products Group wrote to the commission saying “the state monopoly violates United Nations human rights agreements which Canada has signed and ratified in Parliament, and is therefore obligated to uphold.”
The letter cites Article 17(2) of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights that says “no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.”
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It also claims the board is discriminatory by singling out farmers in Western Canada.
Wawota, Sask. organic farmer John Husband, of the OSPG, said organic farmers are being particularly hard hit because they market their own grain.
“They are forced to sell to the board then buy it back at an arbitrary price that can be so high that often sales can not even be made,” Husband said.
That’s not an issue of human rights, Chambers said. Complaints taken up by the commission must fall under specific categories of discrimination, including sex, age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, marital or family status, national or ethnic origin, or pardoned conviction, Chambers said.
Husband said the group will not give up its fight.
“The important thing is to make the government aware, and if the human rights commission won’t deal with it, we’ll have to go directly to the government to point this out.”
