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6 THE RURAL VOICE
Keith Roulston
Society, tike forest, must regenerate
There's a conflict between what
human beings want, and what nature
gives us. We all crave stability:
nature provides constant change. Old
things die and are replaced by new
ones.
Economically
it's the same
way: we'd like to
be able to get to a
nice standard of
living and enjoy
it, but the rules
are always
changing. In the
past decade
nature's model of
"survival of the
fittest" has been
trotted out to
justify a system
in which the big
get bigger and the rich, richer.
But what if a different natural
model is used. In a forest, new
growth is needed to keep the system
healthy. If large old trees are allowed
to dominate the forest, light and
nutrients are denied to the smaller
plants and new growth is killed out.
The forest is in a living death. In
nature, the forest only becomes
dynamic again if there is a forest fire
or high winds or disease topple the
monster trees.
We've learned to manage forests
for maximum production by
harvesting the large trees so the forest
can regenerate from the bottom up.
In our economy, however, we
seem to be cultivating the big trees at
the expense of the little ones: the big
companies at the expense of the
dynamic new businesses that
traditionally have provided the new
ideas ... and the jobs.
Who, for instance, has the most to
gain by the moves to globalization
and free trade? It isn't likely to be the
little company, just starting out in the
back of somebody's garage, that can
take advantage of the reduction of
trade barriers. More likely to gain is
the large multi -national company that
already deals across borders.
When the govemment of Wilfrid
Laurier proposed free trade at the
turn of the century he had the support
of farmers but big business was
against the move. While free trade at
the time was in the interest of
farmers, it wasn't in the interest of
business. If big business suddenly is
promoting free trade it must have the
most to gain.
But ironically, big business also
gains through government regulation.
An old friend in the food processing
business once told me that the food
giants were always in favour of new
packaging regulations because they
could handle the changes required
more easily than the little guys.
Ironically, the provincial NDP
government which is supposed to be
on the side of the little guy, is playing
right into the hands of big business
with regulations like the changes in
meat inspection that mean small
abattoirs killing a few hundred
chickens a year must be government
inspected. The big guys can argue
that everybody should have to live by
the same rules they do. The big guys
would never have got to be big guys
if they'd had to start out with today's
regulations, however. If Kraft Foods
had to meet today's standards when it
started out in J. L. Kraft's kitchen, it
would never be a world-wide power.
Elmer Buchanan, Ontario's
Minister of Agriculture and Food,
says a lot of things that make sense
when he talks about the need for a
rural renaissance, of adding more
value to farm products before they
leave the local community.
Unfortunately, at the same time he's
saying this officials are making it
impossible to start that renaissance by
bringing in more and more
regulations to make it too costly to
start out small and expand.
If we want a healthy economy we
must encourage new people with new
ideas, people who may not have the
capital to start a million -dollar
corporation. If we don't help this
regeneration we'll end up with a
mature economy, like a mature forest,
that can only start growing again
through a major catastrophe.
Unfortunately, our governments seem
to be making it impossible.0
Keith Roulston is editor and
publisher of The Rural Voice as well
as being a playwright. He lives near
Blyth, ON.
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