The Rural Voice, 2006-12, Page 12BOOKS
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8 THE RURAL VOICE
John Beardsley
Surviving despite government programs
John
Beardsley is
a freelance
journalist
and crop
specialist
with Huron
Bay
Cooperative.
Part of the reason people in
government don't appear to listen to
farmers because they don't value
their opinions.
This is strange because I am
convinced that farmers have the
support of the urban public. Report
after report shows that farmers have a
higher confidence rating than most
professions. They beat politicians by
a country mile.
The public have responded almost
as well as politicians at a plowing
match to the "farmers feed cities"
campaign. Consumers easily
understand the wisdom of buying
local food . If the governments want
to help farmers there should be even
more support for the promotion of
eating more Ontario produce
products.
Several years ago the
government's Foodladd Ontario had a
brilliant ad campaign which showed a
Georgia peach being trucked to
Ontario. The message was clear and
understandable — a peach produced
in Canada can ripen on the tree
naturally and still be transported to
the city in a timely fashion. Locally
grown fruits and vegetables taste
better, aie better for you and help
farmers in your own province.
The other thing is that locally
grown food is more environmentally
friendly. Even commodities like grain
and livestock take less energy if they
are produced in this province rather
than being trucked in from the
American Midwest. A study in
Britain of this phenomenon showed
that the environmental footprint of
local food was an even greater benefit
than organic food production.
The botulism in the spinach scare
also points out the dangers of relying
on foreign food. We have more
control of food safety and inspection
standards within our own borders.
The other benefit of spending
money on local food production is
that it cannot be challenged by trade
agreements. Import replacement is an
ideal way of promoting and
suppo ting the local producer.
Farmers in the southwestern part
of the province are facing a huge
discount on their price of corn
because of a high concentration of
vomitoxin and other moulds which
affect the health of breeding
livestock. The mouldy corn can not
even be used to make ethanol because
the vomitoxin is concentrated in the
leftover corn gluten meal. The
ethanol industry has a challenge
getting rid of this by-product at the
best of times; they cannot afford to
have loads turned down because of
high vomitoxin levels.
The McGuinty Liberals are taking
a lot of political heat for breaking yet
another promise on closing the coal
burning plants. They just recently
announced they can't be closed until
2014 because they haven't replaced
the power produced by these plants.
Why doesn't the provincial
government show some leadership
and take ownership of this corn to be
burned in coal fired electrical
generating plants. Anyone who has a
corn stove knows how much heat
they produce and how little ash is left
over. The rising price of corn that this
would produce would give the cash
crop farmer, the fertilizer retailer and
the corn seed industry something to
smile about.
The increasing demand from the
growing ethanol industry on both
sides of the border has driven the new
crop corn price onto a profitable level
for the first time in several years.
Governments have probably slipped
off the hook by doing nothing. But
this is cold comfort for anyone who
has had to wrap up their farming
business in the last few years.
Ironically, if the provincial
government had launched the risk
management program they could
have done so relatively cheaply,
because the market place would have
resulted in no payouts next year on
corn and wheat — which is the lion'