OTTAWA – MPs mulling over issues of rural development last week were offered some practical advice from one small prairie town that has been trying to diversify.
Lyle Knutson, an Elbow, Sask. grain farmer, told members of the Commons agriculture committee that his town’s economic failures and successes might provide lessons.
“In spite of limited budgets, it will be through the co-operation of all levels of government and communities working together that we will achieve the goal of rural renewal and stability,” said Knutson.
While other witnesses before the committee talked more generally about the need to name a federal minister responsible for rural issues, to support supply management and to offer investment incentives for rural areas, Knutson told the story of one small town’s struggle to escape the roller-coaster grain economy.
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In the depths of the farm economy depression of 1991, the town on the edge of Lake Diefenbaker created an economic development committee and began to look for investors.
Community bonds and fund raising attracted two small plants. Both eventually went out of business, victims of a lack of working capital, weak management and inexperienced local people who sat on the boards of directors.
Meanwhile, Elbow has attracted a piano bench manufacturing company and is looking into the possibility of a fish farm enterprise and a hotel/convention centre complex.
And in early December, negotiations opened with Saskatchewan Wheat Pool about the possibility of a joint venture to establish an intensive hog operation in the area. Knutson said the pool would contribute half the capital and provide the management to run the operation.
Matching local investors with larger companies in joint ventures “will provide the job spinoffs and stable investment which will strengthen local areas.”
But the highest priority is finding enough federal and provincial dollars to upgrade the road system.
“With all the positive rural development issues taking place in Saskatchewan, it is critical that the road infrastructure problem be tackled now.”
Political support needed
During the two-hour committee hearing, supply management representatives told MPs that continued support of the system by politicians is an important rural development policy.
And Ken Huttema, chair of the Canadian Broiler Hatching Egg Marketing Agency, warned that despite a recent trade victory on an American challenge to supply management tariffs, international challenges will continue.
“The writing is on the wall,” he said. “The American industry and administration do not intend to let the matter end there. That is why we need the continued support of the federal government in ensuring that none of the American attempts to weaken our import control system are successful.”
The Canadian Federation of Agriculture promoted its view that a minister responsible for rural issues should be added to cabinet.
President Jack Wilkinson said it would not require a new department or a large bureaucracy. It would require a minister able to promote the rural interest in all government decisions.
“He or she would be a watchdog and spokesperson,” added CFA member Loretta Smith from Ontario.
The idea of a minister for rural issues has been gaining some credence in Ottawa and may be one of the recommendations coming next winter from the Commons natural resources committee which has held hearings on the rural economy.
