GMO debate
To the Editor:
In Doug Bone’s Nov. 4 letter to the editor, he expresses some concerns regarding the Western Canadian Wheat Growers’ (Association) willingness to foster discussion on the issue of biotechnology. He makes some broad statements that warrant clarification.
This rapidly emerging issue in Canada will have ramifications that affect farmers, consumers, academia, industry and government. Open, thoughtful debate can only enlighten and challenge us to be more knowledgeable about a scientific process that has been in existence for many years. …
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We share Mr. Bone’s concern over the speed of the science and the ability of our customers to adapt to the various peculiarities of genetically modified foods.
Labeling of products may have merit. However, our competitors seem focused on labeling our GMO foods and not their own. We believe the issue should be decided based on fairness, not used as a non-tariff trading barrier.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency rigorously tests GMO foods by selecting out their unique proteins and secondary metabolites and testing these substances separately. These chromatograph tests aren’t done on non-GMO foods.
This agency is respected the world over. We need to understand more of what they do so we can insure its continued credibility.
Most of the cheese we eat and the insulin we use to treat diabetes utilizes genetically altered organisms in their production. Responding to opponents of biotech by overreacting to their propaganda won’t help and in fact may hurt people who depend on its products.
We respect the views of organic producers to choose how they produce and market their crops. Non-organic producers should also have as many cropping options available as possible. If we don’t justifiably defend technologies that benefit farmers and consumers, then who are we going to let dictate our farming practices?
It is likely wishful thinking to blame our agricultural crisis on one sector, as Mr. Bone does. However, the control and independence that he advocates as we deal with our own unique challenges is positive.
Nobody has all the answers to the future of agricultural biotechnology. It will serve us poorly if we become frightened by dubious claims from either side of the argument.
Advances in sciences have allowed us to live healthier, longer, more prosperous lives since we have dared to understand more about ourselves and our world. The challenges are daunting and the opportunities immeasurable. The debate about genetically altered organisms isn’t going away anytime soon.
– Greg Douglas,
Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association,
Regina, Sask.
Conquering West
To the Editor:
The attitude of Prime Minister ChrŽtien in turning his back on our western farmers makes sense when piecing together long-term plans I have seen and heard … .
Alienation of Western Canada is planned, as a separated Canada will make it easier for the U. S. to gain control of our natural resources.
This is part of the push to create dissension in Quebec for separation. The game-plan is to divide and conquer.
In 1980 I remember seeing a projected U.S. economic study showing a map of Canada with five added states by 2005.
This map showed B.C./Alberta as one state; Saskatchewan/Manitoba; Ontario; Quebec; and the Maritimes including Newfoundland and Labrador as the fifth state.
It appears this take-over plan is unfolding as planned. So, do we separate from the East, or insist on referendum and recall to get rid of the dictators and traitors in Ottawa?
The only good I have seen come from this so far is the non-partisan attitude developing to save our farmers and province.
Those who want control always divide to conquer whether it is by party, language, race, gender or province.
-ÊH.E. Butler,
Rabbit Lake, Sask.
Accepted advice
To the Editor:
After 20 years of farming I’m doing exactly what the federal agriculture minister suggests, “rethinking being in the farming industry.”
We started out with three quarters of land we bought from a neighbor. Over the years we’ve accumulated more with the idea of some day being able to quit my full-time job and making a living off the land.
We started out with 10 cows and a bundle of posts. This year we will calve out 60. With the help of the off-farm income we have always paid our bills on time.
Four years ago we had enough money in the bank to sow our 1,500 acres of crop. Since then things went into a tailspin. We are struggling to pay this spring’s fuel, fertilizer and chemical bills.
Mr. Vanclief, we are taking your advice and have decided to get out of the farming industry before we don’t have anything left.
– Rhyse Overman,
Hardisty, Alta.
Love-hate Canada
To the Editor:
I am in the middle of a love-hate relationship with my country. I love Canada. I hate the government in Ottawa.
I have to say that I am now a western Canadian separatist. I am no longer a federalist (because of) recent events in Ottawa with the premiers of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, the west coast fishing fiasco, the emasculation of a population with gun control, a court system that does not support the efforts of our policemen – it goes on and on.
I perceive a real danger to democratic freedom with no checks and balances on the power of the government in Ottawa.
We in the West really have no alternative. We will never have the population to effect real change in Ottawa. Every representative we send to Parliament seems to become a defacto easterner.
We do not need Ottawa and its expensive bureaucracy. We need a government closer to home. We need a government that understands our needs.
We need a government that operates under a constitution that guarantees that it cannot become a dictatorship. We need a government that limits the length of time a politician can remain in power.
I am looking for someone to stand up and say enough is enough. How about it Premier Romanow? Are you logical enough to understand that westerners will always be the losers in confederation?
We need a leader who is not a nutcase. We need someone with your stature. I am asking you outright in public. Will you be that?
– L. B. Wotton,
Merritt, B.C.
Decent price
To the Editor:
In recent articles in The Western Producer, I’m reading that farm groups and certain government sectors are saying that we have to get farm aid out to producers that need it most.
Haven’t all farmers taken a substantial cut in what they produce? Most farmers that need aid the most are probably the ones who went from 10 quarters of land to something like 30, 40, or 50 quarters of land and up, in a system instituted by all the plutocrats, governments, agricultural planners, etc.
They encouraged farms to get big and now with the farm crisis, they turn their backs on them.
I think all farmers are entitled to get a decent price for what they produce, no matter what the situation.
How many people in all the other sectors of our strike-riddled economy would like to have their personal finances and property scrutinized, then have it determined during a strike that anyone with a substantial bank account and excessive property be told they don’t qualify for a pay increase because they don’t need it? You can bet there would be a lot of screaming from coast to coast. …
I’m also wary of any government, federal or provincial, that promotes excessive tax cutting. The greatest beneficiaries of tax cuts are the rich and in the process, essential services are jeopardized for the poor and the elderly.
Our governments need to be totally restructuring our tax systems so that it benefits the average (citizen) and takes the biggest bites out of these obscenely high income classes without discouraging progressive occupations.
I refuse to believe anyone making hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars a year can’t adequately live on one or two hundred thousand a year, no matter what their education. …
– Allan Schriml,
Pilger, Sask.
Second-class
To the Editor:
Wake up farmers. We have been subsidizing Canadian consumers for a long time but we don’t have to be the poor country cousins. Farmers, our government and consumers will have to realize that every dollar spent in the nation can be traced to the farmgate.
The labor unions have the power to paralyze the entire economy because our government, in order to get votes, gave them the right to strike.
Farmers, I believe we have more clout than that. We can stop buying (new equipment, for example, most of us could get by for another year.) It wouldn’t be long before about a half million people would be out of work. We would have a major recession.
My opinion is that the farmers’ share of the food dollar can’t go down any more than it is now.
Our problem began in the late ’70s when we had three percent inflation due to resources becoming more scarce. Environment and many other things made it more difficult to maintain that standard of living. To overcome these, logic says that we should have all worked harder or tightened our belts.
The working people, however, decided to pass this on to someone else. They demanded and got a three percent increase in pay so now we had six percent inflation. The next year they demanded and got a six percent raise in pay and then, every year, an increase until it rose to 13 percent annually….
The price of grain is set on the world market. Three quarters of the people in the world make less money in a day, some even in a week, than what the people that provide our services are paid in an hour. The result is that thousands of people are dying of starvation every year….
Should our working people be entitled to that high a standard of living on that amount of productivity, while farmers and the poor people are suffering?
If this article were printed in all farm papers, we would likely get at least 50 percent of the farmers supporting it, and that would probably be enough to show the consumers and our government where the money is coming from.
They are getting 57 loaves of white and 100 loaves of whole wheat bread out of a bushel of wheat, 333 bottles (12 oz.) of beer out of a bushel of barley, 38 to 42 pounds of spaghetti out of a bushel of durum and 105 bottles (40 oz.) of whiskey from a bushel of rye.
The farmers’ share of the price of food is so small that if the farmers were to donate their portion, it would be hardly noticeable.
How long are we going to subsidize the working people and be second class citizens?
– Mathew Wozniak,
Grande Prairie, Alta.
Blinkers on
To the Editor:
I heard on the radio and TV that judges in Saskatchewan want $65,000 salary increases. Nurses want more money, as do civil service employees at one time or another. Minimum wages are increased by the government also. Do they get it? Of course they do.
My father sold his farm in the fall of 1966. At that time he was getting over $4 for a bushel of wheat. The price of producing any of the grains was reasonable.
Today the farmer who bought my father’s land gets around $2 for a bushel of wheat. The price of the rest of the grains has also taken a downhill slide.
Has the price of production decreased as well? No, it has not. It has increased and increased and increased. How can anyone in the federal and provincial governments say the farmers are doing OK? They have blinkers on.
I have a suggestion. Let everyone in the workforce, from the lowest wage earner to the highest paid worker, or Prime Minister, Agriculture Minister, take a similar cut in pay. …
– Karin McGratten,
Shell Lake, Sask.
