A brief reference in last week’s federal budget about plans to refocus farm business risk management programs has farm leaders speculating about what Ottawa has in mind.
They are also are raising increasing doubts about whether a scheduled April 1, 2013, launch of the new Growing Forward five-year plan, with its refocused farm programs, really can be accomplished by the scheduled date.
Implementation of the first Growing Forward programs was delayed a year until 2009 because all the details had not been worked out by the scheduled implementation date.
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Ontario Federation of Agriculture president Mark Wales was one of last week’s skeptics.
“I think it will be pretty tough to meet the deadline,” he said.
“There was not a lot of forward movement last year with so many elections federal and provincial and some new ministers.”
A federal-provincial ministerial meeting planned for March 29 was cancelled because of the federal budget. It is to be rescheduled during the week of April 16.
Ministers are supposed to sign the final deal at a mid-September meeting in Whitehorse to give bureaucrats six months to write the program details by April 1, 2013.
Wales said final consultations with Ontario farmers are not scheduled until June.
“Just looking at that, it’s going to be very difficult to have a signed agreement by September, and if it’s not signed in September, then all of the other paperwork to be ready by April 1 really can’t happen,” he said.
He said a delay would be better than “not getting the details right.”
Canadian Federation of Agriculture president Ron Bonnett said governments “are really pushing up against the wire to get this done on time.”
Grain Growers of Canada executive director Richard Phillips said he doubts a final political agreement can be signed before the end of the year, but for the moment he will trust official promises that the new five-year plan will be ready April 1.
“I’ll say they are promising to get things done by April,” he said. “For now, I’ll be optimistic that this is a realistic deadline.”
Meanwhile, the March 29 federal budget referred to negotiations for the next five-year farm program policy, arguing that the Conservative government intends to “see a focus on setting the right conditions for farmers and businesses in the agriculture and agri-food sector to compete and adapt.”
The Growing Forward federal-provincial agreement will be part of that.
“The new five-year framework agreement will set out policies and programs to support a modern, innovative and market-oriented sector,” said the budget.
Does that signal a shift from farm income support programs to regulatory reform and market opportunities that tell farmers they should be able to make it in the market without much help?
