If one were to trace the depth and degree of problems facing agriculture today, one might find a direct correlation to the widening gap between rural and urban populations.
As Canada and the world become more urbanized, ever larger numbers of people are unaware of the costs -economic, ecological and social – associated with producing cheap and healthy food.
Given the economic and political power of urban populations and their growing isolation from rural realities, small wonder at the dearth of political and social will to improve conditions for the nation’s farmers.
Read Also

Proactive approach best bet with looming catastrophes
The Pan-Canadian Action Plan on African swine fever has been developed to avoid the worst case scenario — a total loss ofmarket access.
James Miller, a professor of religious studies at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., is involved in a study on religion and ecology. His address to the Canadian Rural Church Network conference in Muenster, Sask., last weekend sparked the above train of thought.
Miller said his studies show that stability and prosperity are a result of balance. Thus the current rural-urban imbalance is contrary to stability and prosperity, and we’ve certainly seen that to be true in the farm sector.
Miller contends that most people don’t understand how their lives are dependent on the ecology and environment. I would in turn contend that farmers and ranchers have a deeper understanding of that than the urban populace, but that was not Miller’s point.
Rather, he suggests there is a mismatch between science and general culture. Scientifically, we know we depend on nature, but economically we tend to view nature as a resource with external value that can be extracted for our own purposes. The environment suffers as a result.
We put our faith in progress, says Miller. Knowledge is our god and technology is our saviour. But scientific progress doesn’t necessarily enhance human freedom or happiness, he notes.
Does anyone dare to question the value of progress? It’s a novel idea.
Adoption of new technology and scientific advancement has been vital to Canadian agriculture, and will doubtless continue to be so in the foreseeable future. Yet the stability and prosperity of the industry haven’t developed or improved apace.
Miller’s point is that we need to question the value of progress; not necessarily halt it, but define it and evaluate it without assuming that the end justifies the means.
No less a personage that Martin Luther King Jr. had this to say about the need for such evaluation: “All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem.”