Federal agriculture minister Gerry Ritz has moved beyond promising that the Conservative government will defend supply management in trade talks to now promising the sector will be protected.
“We have said all along we’ll never trade off supply management,” he said during an appearance before the House of Commons agriculture committee Dec. 1. “We see it as a very valuable part of our agricultural sector.”
Later, he told New Democrat Alex Atamanenko that Canada will not accept an increase in the amount of foreign dairy, poultry and egg product allowed into the country under supply management and grade rules.
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“We have no intention of changing it.”
He made the comments at the end of a week in which critics of supply management increased their calls to end or reduce tariff protections that they say produce higher dairy, chicken and egg prices for Canadian consumers.
On Dec. 2, the Canadian Dairy Commission announced prices will be allowed to increase 1.5 percent next year to cover increased dairy production costs.
“We have a 40-year-old supply management system where dairy prices are being made behind closed doors,” Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association vice-president Justin Taylor said in a news release.
“It’s time we built a dairy system in Canada that is fair and transparent for farmers, processors, restaurateurs and consumers.”
Meanwhile, defenders of the Canadian Wheat Board single desk notched up their predictions that supply management is likely doomed in the wake of the Nov. 28 Commons vote to end the CWB single desk next year.
“Supply management will be next,” former CWB board chair Larry Hill said in Ottawa. “It will be the next target.”
But last week during a news conference in Ottawa to celebrate the end of the CWB monopoly, Ritz insisted the wheat board single desk and the supply-managed system are not comparable.
He said dairy, chicken and egg producers are not captive the way western wheat and barley farmers are.
“They actually have that freedom now,” he said. “They make a decision based on their bottom line as to what and how much quota to buy, unlike the wheat board system where you’re forced to join it just simply because of where you live.”
Hill said later it would be like arguing that if you do not want to be part of the single desk, you do not have to grow wheat or barley. If you want to produce and sell milk, you have to adhere to the marketing and production control system.
