Canadian farmers who survived years of low prices and minimal yields in the 1990s and early 2000s owe a debt of gratitude to Bob Hopley.
In 1972, Hopley, who farmed with his wife, Lynne, near Oak River, Man., came up with an idea that would radically change risk management programs in Canadian agriculture.
His idea eventually became the Net Income Stabilization Account (NISA), in which farmers contributed a portion of their earnings in good years and withdrew from their personal accounts in lean years.
At a July 16 ceremony in Portage la Prairie, Man., Hopley was inducted into the Manitoba Agricultural Hall of Fame for creating NISA and making other contributions to Canadian agriculture.
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Raymond Redfern, president of Redfern Farm Services, an agricultural product and service retailer in Manitoba, was one of several people who nominated Hopley.
He was in the middle of a meeting when he was telephoned for an interview, but he stopped the meeting to take the call.
“I have time to talk about Bob Hopley,” Redfern said.
“Every farmer in Canada has benefitted from the programs he helped promote and design.”
Hopley came up with the basic concept for NISA in the early 1970s be-cause he was concerned about in-come stability and managing financial risk in farming.
Several years later, he served on the advisory committee for the Western Grain Stabilization program, which compensated prairie farmers in years of poor incomes.
“A payout was when the total re-ceipts for the whole area, which was the prairie provinces, fell short,” said Hopley, who retired from farming in 1995 and now lives in Brandon.
“The program made up the difference between that and a five year (production) average.”
However, Hopley and many others thought the program wasn’t fair because every participating farmer received a payment regardless of crop yields.
“The (farmers) that needed it the most got the least. It was based on what you had sold,” he said.
“The more (grain) you sold, the more you got.”
A few producers and policy makers wanted to amend the risk management program to account for regional variations.
“I thought if you’re going to make it a smaller (geography), why not bring it back to the individual (farm),” said Hopley, who was born in Redvers, Sask., but moved with his family to Manitoba at an early age.
His family eventually settled in Oak River.
After years of politely sharing his NISA concept, Hopley’s opportunity came in 1988. A drought decimated crop yields in Western Canada, and politicians were desperate for solutions.
“The Western Grain Stabilization program had run into a deficit, and government had to come up with a bunch of money to make the payments,” Hopley said.
“Ministers really wanted to have a different type of program.”
He said federal agriculture minister Don Mazankowski and minister of state for grains and oilseeds Charlie Mayer liked the NISA concept and helped it become public policy.
Redfern said Hopley’s quiet demeanor and depth of knowledge was the difference maker when it came to dealing with politicians, farm leaders and other farmers.
“If you saw Bob Hopley in a meeting … he didn’t say much. But when he spoke, people listened.”
Redfern said Hopley and Owen McAuley, a farmer from McAuley, Man., spent hours attending farm meetings across Canada and convincing farm groups to support NISA.
The Manitoba Agricultural Hall of Fame said every province in Canada backed the NISA program.
“By 2004, over $3.4 billion had been placed in NISA accounts by Canadian farmers and both levels of government,” it said.
“This was the ultimate validation of (Hopley’s) program by the Canadian farming community.”
Hopley also served on dozens of boards and committees during his career and was appointed an honorary member of the Manitoba Institute of Agrologists.
He no longer owns land and isn’t involved in agricultural policy, but he still follows the industry closely. He said farming is a special occupation, and it’s something that gets in your blood.
“You miss being a farmer. You maybe don’t miss doing the work.”
