JoAnne Buth | Former Canola Council of Canada president surprised by agriculture industry’s lack of profile in Ottawa
One of the first things JoAnne Buth did last winter as a newly minted Conservative prairie senator was to request a report by a Liberal predecessor.
As chair of the Senate agriculture committee in the 1980s, Liberal Herb Sparrow produced the Soils at Risk report on soil conservation, which has become the Senate’s all-time best seller, helped change farming practices in Canada and got him into the Order of Canada and the Soil Conservation of Canada hall of fame.
A copy is now in Buth’s desk in the Victoria Building across from Parliament Hill.
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The former president of the Canola Council of Canada said in an interview that Sparrow’s ability to make a difference as a senator inspired her when she was unexpectedly picked in January by prime minister Stephen Harper to fill a Manitoba vacancy.
“I have spent most of my career in agriculture,” Buth said in one of her first Senate speeches. “When I recently became a senator, one of my first thoughts was, ‘would I be able to make a difference? Who did I know that had made a difference as a senator?’ Of course, the first name that came to mind was Herb Sparrow.”
In an increasingly partisan Parliament, Buth’s tribute to a Liberal was a reflection of the fact that while she is a conservative who supports the Harper government’s direction and sits as a Conservative senator, she was not a Conservative partisan before her January appointment.
Buth said in the interview that the lack of partisan background is an advantage in her new role as senator and a member of the Senate agriculture committee, where Sparrow once presided.
“This is an area where broad interests are accommodated and I think I bring to it an ability to understand issues broadly without the political side,” she said.
Although the 57-year-old can sit in the Senate until May 23, 2029, when she turns 75, she agreed to a nine-year term when appointed and agreed to support Conservative proposals to reform the Senate into an elected body with term limits.
After first thinking she would never run for Senate election, Buth said she is now reconsidering if Manitoba ever agrees to Senate elections.
“I just might run.”
But for the moment, she mainly wants to be seen as agriculture’s voice in the Senate.
“I think profitability in the industry is important, I think innovation is important,” she said.
“Of course, agricultural sustainability is an area I would like to delve more deeply into and this is a perfect forum to do that. Water management will be a huge issue in the future.”
Unlike the more partisan and elected House of Commons, the Senate allows broader debate on issues on the floor and in committees.
“I want to use that opportunity to highlight agricultural issues,” said Buth. “And I want agriculture to know I intend to be their voice here. I want to hear from them if they have issues.”
Before leading the canola council, Buth worked for the federal and Manitoba governments in agriculture jobs.
She said that experience and her industry leadership prepared her somewhat for her role.
What she did not expect was the lack of profile agriculture has in Ottawa despite its economic and political importance.
It does not rate much space in the media that players in political Ottawa consume, which makes it a low profile issue.
“It is one of my goals as a senator to raise that profile, and I’m in the process of developing a vision that I would like to see as promoting the industry,” said Buth.
