IS THERE enough meat for farmers in the alphabet soup of government farm support programs? A formal audit would be a good way to find out.
The federal auditor general’s office is considering whether to launch such an audit. It should proceed and report to Parliament on the results.
There are complaints about every farm support effort. We need only recall the Agricultural Income Disaster Assistance program, the Gross Revenue Insurance Plan, the Net Income Stabilization Account, the Canadian Farm Income Program and others to know that is true.
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But the problems voiced about the current version, the Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization program, seem particularly numerous.
Objections to the deposit requirement were just the first of many flaws producers have discovered in the complex program. Not the least of those is CAIS’s reliance on ever-shrinking margins to calculate payouts, therefore providing support to an ever-smaller farm income.
Complexity is difficult to avoid when designing a program that satisfies farmers in need while complying with trade requirements and budgetary limits.
If past programs are a guide, it seems farm aid can be delivered quickly or it can be delivered based on need, but not both. Financial aid sent to quickly address economic hardship will invariably be distributed, in some degree, to those not deemed to need it.
Yet an accurate calculation of need requires an income-based program, which by its nature can only deliver funding long after financial damage has been inflicted on the eventual recipients.
So-called “whole farm” programs allow the government to comply with trade restrictions, yet such programs lack the flexibility to assist farmers across all commodities. One size does not fit all in the diversified Canadian agricultural world of the 21st century.
Moreover, as government tries to meet these challenges, it tends to create a huge bureaucracy that, in addition to slowing aid delivery and dragging out any appeals process, tends to eat up a good percentage of the total money allocated to the program.
CAIS has been studied and changes are proposed. As that process plays out, it would be prudent to undertake an audit of government farm support program spending. The results of such an audit could have a bearing on eventual improvements to CAIS and its successors.
An audit can determine whether the federal government is getting value for its money, which is crucial information for taxpayers, government and the farm program administrative bureaucracy.
More importantly, an audit would determine whether the programs are delivering value to Canadian farmers. That is the nub of the issue.
The motion for an audit, brought forward by the Conservative opposition, should be granted so an audit can proceed in the coming year.
