TORONTO – Ontario agriculture minister Helen Johns couldn’t stop herself from talking about manure, even though the topic of the federal-provincial agriculture ministers’ meeting Jan. 31 was farm safety nets.
“We’re making progress on the nutrient management file,” she was overhead saying to one Ontario farm leader hovering around the edge of the ministers’ meeting.
But that’s not on the agenda today, she was told.
“It’s never far from my mind.”
There is a good reason for that attention.
Ontario’s agriculture minister has prided herself on being an ally to the industry, insisting she will not sign any federal-provincial safety nets deal that “my producers” do not support.
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But the politics of environmental regulation have proven volatile and treacherous.
In the midst of growing public concern about large livestock operations, manure management, nutrient spreading and water safety, Ontario’s Conservative government brought in legislation last summer.
Ontario’s farm groups had supported the move as a way to establish provincial rules and stop local councils from setting their own rules, which were making it almost impossible for farmers to operate in some municipalities.
“We were getting a patchwork of rules as local councils acted, often under pressure from environmentalists,” said Ontario Federation of Agriculture president Ron Bonnett.
But when farmers saw the regulations in December, the farm community reacted almost with one voice – they were too tough, too intrusive, too costly, and too unrealistic in what they demanded of farmers.
Johns has been working ever since to appease the farm lobby, to amend some of the more controversial proposals, to move her department more to the forefront while pushing the environment department into the background.
The OFA has been negotiating, believing that the worst of it can be avoided and that rules are inevitable.
Other farm groups have followed other strategies. The National Farmers Union is insisting that only large farms be regulated and that small and medium-sized livestock operations be exempt. The Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario is proposing a six-month delay in implementation.
