The Rural Voice, 1988-10, Page 74HURON
County Federation of Agriculture NEWSLETTER
Box 429, Clinton, Ontario NOM 1L0
519-482-9642
* The Rural Voice is provided to all farmers
in Huron County by the HCFA
MINUTES FROM THE 1988 REGIONAL MEETING
Minutes of the HCFA regional meet-
ing, Clinton Public School, Thursday,
September 15,1988, 8:30 p.m.
Paul Klopp, president of the HCFA,
welcomed about 60 members to the
1988 regional meeting.
OFA vice-president Roger George
was introduced by Doug Garniss, an
OFA executive member as well as a
Huron County director. Mr. George
discussed some very interesting points
regarding free trade as a hindrance to
Canada.
One problem is that "Canadian farm-
ers have half the continent, but they
happen to have the north half." Once he
visited a farm in California and saw
watermelons coming out of the fields by
truckloads. He was told those water-
melons could be in Toronto in 48 hours
— that's faster than shipping from
North Bay to Toronto. And one winery
in California could supply all the Cana-
dian market by running for an additional
12 minutes a day.
Supply management has been pro-
tected up to now, he said. If Canadian
processors are to compete and have no
tariffs to protect them, they have to get
raw materials at the same price as their
American competitors or go broke.
Major processors, like McCains, for
example, which paid for a large portion
of the anti -free trade ads, will survive
because they can shift their operations to
the U.S., but they are concerned for the
Canadian farmer.
Some areas of farming will benefit
from the agreement. Will the gains be
worth the losses? Roger George quoted
an OMAF study showing that red meat
producers could expect to get an extra
$18 million benefit from the deal, but
other areas of farming would lose $113
million, meaning a negative $95 million
impact.
Under free trade, over the years the
Canadian currency is bound to pull
closer to the U.S. dollar, losing Cana-
dian farmers their biggest trade benefit.
What alternative docs Canada have
to trading with the U.S.? An export
agency such as Canagrex could be re -
72 THE RURAL VOICE
established to seek export markets.
Some companies are doing a good job of
getting more exports, but the agency
could co-ordinate such efforts. Canada
is one of the few countries that doesn't
have a trade agency.
Jack Riddell misses "Best Chance"
... Jack Riddell has missed his chance to
be one of the best agricultural ministers
in Ontario's history, Mr. George said.
Mr. Riddell had a premier and a treas-
urer who had an understanding of agri-
culture and he should have used that op-
portunity to really accomplish things for
farmers. Instead the civil servants seem
to have a stranglehold on the Ministry of
Agriculture and Food headquarters.
Mr. Riddell doesn't see how the
proposed automatic checkoff is impor-
tant to support general farm organiza-
tions.
The OFA must have more than its
current $200,000 budget to do the
proper job for farmers. The checkoff
would help provide that kind of funding
to the OFA, CFFO, and general fans
groups by making all farmers pay to
support a general farm organization.
"All we're asking Jack Riddell to do is to
acknowledge the concept that ' we have
to get to the minister or we have to get a
new minister.— If the OFA can't get
action from Riddell, we shall have to go
directly to Peterson.
Riddell did not take action on a crop
insurance review committee's recom-
mendations of last year. Therefore the
government should help out farmers
hurt by this year's drought. Those rec-
ommendations of last year included 90
per cent coverage instead of 80 per cent,
that farmers pay one-third of the pre-
mium with the federal government pick-
ing up one-third and the province one-
third, and separate farm coverage so that
if a farmer's had bad damage on one
farm but not another he will get insur-
ance payment on his losses and not have
the whole farming operation pooled to
determine the percentage of loss, as is
presently the case.
Farmers would not have much rea-
son to complain this year if these recom-
mendations had been carried out last
year. There is nothing wrong with the
crop insurance plan except it is 20 years
old. It was designed for the 100 -acre
farm, not the 2,000 to 3,000 acres some
cash -crop producers have today.
Dealing with OIFFIRR, Mr. George
said there wasn't much hope of change.
Mr. Riddell's idea to cut the program to
40 per cent this year and phase it out by
next year is, in Mr. George's mind, a
mistake. He is trying to save money by
cutting the scope of the program. It
would cost an additional $20 million to
put the program back up to 70 per cent
and more to return to 100 per cent.
He had praise for the special grains
and oilseeds fund of the federal govern-
ment, saying that credit must be given
for getting the program in place and
making it work very well. Little praise
was given to the Farm Credit Corpora-
tion. "Why would anyone want to keep
it? It's mandate is to break even. What
we've got is another chartered bank, the
same as the other five." The FCC should
be a body to help farmers with lower
interest rates, but instead it raised the
interest rates by a half percentage point
to 12.5.
Many questions and much discus-
sion followed Mr. George's presenta-
tion. Chris Palmer thanked him on
behalf of everyone present.
Advanced Agricultural Leadership
Program information was discussed
and anyone interested in participating
this year may get forms from the county
office. The information must be in by
September 19, 1988.
Crop Insurance Questionnaire from
the OFA: filled out at meeting by the
general public and returned to the OFA
for further discussion.
Constitution: At a January direc-
tors' meeting several minor changes
were discussed and proposed to be made
to our HCFA Constitution. A commit-
tee was struck of Brenda McIntosh,
Doug Gamiss, Chris Palmer, Jim McIn-
tosh, Murray Crawford, and Bob Harri-
son. Brenda McIntosh presented these
(cone d on page 71)