On a sunny June day in 2002 at a carefully scripted event organized by the prime minister’s office, the heavy agricultural hitters of Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government drove in convoy an hour south of Ottawa to announce agricultural peace in our time, a five-year $5.2 billion program that would move the industry “beyond crisis management,” make funding predictable and end the need for emergency funding.
Four years later, the Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization program is in tatters, denounced by many farmers and targeted for euthanasia by the new Conservative government.
In this special report, Ottawa reporter Barry Wilson examines the journey from the optimism of 2002 to the demand for change in 2006.
