HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2003-06-04, Page 1m ntiiTwn The Citizen
Serving the communities of Blyth and Brussels and northern Huron County
Volume 19 No. 22 Wednesday, June 4, 2003 75 Cents (70c + 5c gst)
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Inside this week
Students learn
about HyperStudio
Brussels Squirts
begin with win
BMG pool staff
ready for summer
Rachlis leaves
AMDSB
students
visit
local
hospitals
Four hospitals in northern Huron
County are participating in Rural
Regional Medicine Discovery Week
which initiates medical students into
the life of small town physicians.
Clinton Public, Seaforth
Community, Wingham and District
and Alexandra Marine and General
Hospitals received first-year
medical students from the
University of Western Ontario
during this week, June 2-6.
Designed to encourage new
doctors to practise in rural and
regional centres, “the program is
vital in helping students graduate
with knowledge, skills and interest
to pick these as a career choice,”
said Dr. Jim O’Rourke, director of
Western’s Southwestern Ontario
Rural Regional Medicine Unit
which operates out of Goderich.
O’Rourke said he has seen the
impact the program has had in its six
years of operation. “Individuals are
getting a first taste of practice in a
small centre in the first year, and
that is influencing the directions
they consider as they complete
medical school and enter residency
programs.”
The week-long program offers the
students experiences which vary
from large centres such as the
Southwestern Ontario Medical
Education Network in Windsor to
the eight-bed facility in Wiarton.
They will observe rural and regional
emergency departments, childbirth,
family doctors’ offices, house calls,
how local specialists operate and
how doctors participate in the
communities.
One hundred and thirty-four
students are fanning out to 34 rural
and community hospitals and
medical centres in Southwestern
Ontario.
Local track athletes
do well at OFSSA
A different show on stage
Bryan Allen brought CKNX radio’s The Talk Show to the Blyth Festival stage Thursday
morning. Allen, far left, spoke with Artistic Director Eric Coates, centre, and director Paul
Thompson about their upcoming shows The Perilous Pirate’s Daughter and Hippie,
respectively, as well as the impact of the theatre on the community. Also on the panel were
former artistic director and actor Janet Amos and, her husband, writer and actor Ted Johns.
(Sarah Mann photo)
BSE fallout hits industry
By Janice Becker
Citizen staff
Though the nightly rhetoric
regarding the mad cow case in
Alberta has subsided somewhat, the
fall-out from the May 20 report
continues to resonate through the
agricultural industry in this area.
Feedlot farmers are beginning to
struggle because of cattle that need
to be moved and the beef sector as
well as hog producers are finding
alternatives for the disposal of dead
animals.
The deadstock industry has been
hit hard, with farmers requesting
removal, but no outlet for their
product.
Atwood Pet Foods, the largest
deadstock collector in the province,
closed its doors May 27 after
working for a week to keep things
going.
Owner Dave Smith said 60 to 70
per cent of his revenue was “gone
just like that.”
“The meat market is gone and
cross border market is gone and
rendering is in turmoil. They don’t
know if they want our material or
not. I have $30 left that I get for the
beef hide. How far does that go?”
Neil Vincent, president of the
Huron County Federation of
Agriculture agrees that the deadstock
industry is in trouble. “Hides only
pay the bills. Rendering gives them
their income; it determines profit or
loss. If they can’t get anything they
are losing money.”
Smith said he worked feverishly
for a week, but with his hands tied,
he said all he can do is sit at home
and wait for word from “higher up”.
Those involved in the industry
were in Queen’s Park last Thursday
to talk with Agriculture Minister and
Huron-Bruce MPP Helen Johns and
though they were all sympathetic to
the problem, Smith said no one was
making a move to get funding going.
“Even a bandage would help. We
need help soon.”
Not only is Smith worried about
his own business and other
deadstock collectors - Grinsven
Stock Removal of Middlesex County
and Oxford Deadstock of Lambton
have also closed, accounting for 80
to 85 per cent of the deadstock
removal in the province - he is
concerned with what it will do to the
safety of the food system if
producers turn to on farm burial
rather that trying to find a collector.
Abbatoirs do testing, said Smith,
but what happens to the one
staggering in the back field that is
shot and buried. Who tests or traces
that? How do we prove the
deadstock is BSE free if it is not
tested?
“We are trying to work with the
government to test and protect the
food chain.
In a news release last Thursday, the
provincial government was calling
on Ottawa to immediately provide
financial help for the deadstock
industry to avoid a major health and
environmental risk from developing.
Johns said the “collapse of the
deadstock and rendering industry
would put the province’s entire
livestock production and meat
processing industries in jeopardy.”
Smith and Vincent also voiced
concerns about the practice of on-
farm burial, currently one of only
two solutions, the other being
composting, which are permitted
under the deadstock act.
Not only does this practice not
support the deadstock industry, said
Smith, but it could raise
environmental questions,
particularly for large operations.
“In one month, we take 300 to 350
pigs per day, 50-60 cows, Stockers
and heifers and 80-100 calves. If this
is composted where will we find the
land for spreading?”
Vincent was equally concerned
about the burial of large volumes of
animals. “One or two animals are
okay, but with feedlots of 400 to 500
animals that lose two per cent, you
have eight to 12 animals in one hole.
That is a lot of decaying matter in
one place.”
Vincent believes the entire
industry could see changes after this.
“It may cost us a little to keep
rendering going, but we need to look
at other ways of using the product as
well.”
He also sees the far reaching
effects of this lone BSE case. “A lot
of people don’t realize that the $11
million a day being lost by the beef
industry affects many pockets. In the
Huron agricultural study, it said that
for every $1 produced by agriculture,
six or seven people handled that
money. There is a multiplier effect.
Even those remotely involved are
impacted.”
Both men are optimistic that on
going meetings would soon bring a
resolution to the problems and that a
news conference scheduled for
Monday afternoon will bring news
that the Canadian beef industry is
moving through the crisis.
On a more positive note, while
producers and deadstock companies
continue to struggle, commercial
enterprises are thus far seeing little
change in buying trends.
Though Cheryl Stroop of Stroop’s
Meat Market in Brussels said she
has been asked about the origin of
their beef products, “no one seems
upset. They don’t seem to be
freaking out like in the cities.
Everyone has been really -relaxed
about it.”
Stroop said there has been a slight
decrease in beef buying, but there
will not be a big impact.
Similar attitudes are being seen in
Blyth where Brent Scrimgeour of
Scrimgeour’s Food Town said sales
are remaining “on par” and he
personally has not received any
comments or questions.
Food Town’s butcher Paul
Greenwood agrees with
Scrimgeour’s assessment, saying he
hasn’t seen any difference in
purchases.
‘Talk
Show’
in Blyth
By Sarah Mann
Student writer
CKNX AM 920 radio host Bryan
Allen brought The Talk Show to the
Blyth Festival stage Thursday
morning.
The show was dedicated to the
Blyth Festival and featured Artistic
Director Eric Coates, Paul
Thompson, Ted Johns, and Janet
Amos.
The topic of the show was the
Blyth experience and the impact of
the Festival on the village over the
past 29 years.
After giving some background
information on the theatre, Allen
started talking with Coates about the
progression of the theatre and what
makes the theatre unique.
“I think the main thing that
separated us from the rest of the pack
is the commitment to new work,”
Coates said.
Another topic of discussion was
the supposed decline of small town
Ontario. “We recognize the threat of
large-scale merchandising that I
think has struck small communities
right across southern Ontario,”
Coates said.
Coates talked about the Blyth Idea
Group and said, “I’m quite certain
this group of people are going to
come up with some really exciting
ideas to bring us into this new
economy. These towns weren’t built
to sustain the way the economy is
developing so we’ve got to think
outside of the box.”
Coates also made clear that it is not
just a theatre in Blyth, the .proper title
is the Blyth Centre for the Arts which
incorporates an art gallery, a choir,
the Blyth Festival Singers, and an
orchestra. “To have all that existing
in a town of 1000, it absolutely
makes my jaw drop everyday.”
Coates talked about this season’s
opening night production. The
Perilous Pirates Daughter, which he
is directing.
“...this is the challenge that I have
to rise to. , . I think there’s going to
be a lot of productions of it in the
future at other theatres, which is one
of the main goals when you’re
producing new work. But mainly 1
think it’s going to take the roof off
this place on opening night.”
Paul Thompson had a chance to
speak about Hippie, which he is
directing and writing with Kelly
McIntosh and Jonathan Garfinkel.
“There was a huge amount of
idealism [in the ‘60s] and the major
focus of that idealism was actually
these urban kids trying to deal with
nature. They thought they could just
come and everything would be
beautiful.”
“And the stories that we got to hear
around here were quite different.”
Ted Johns and Janet Amos also
took the stage to talk about their play
Bamboozled and how the
community and the theatre
experience go hand-in-hand.
Continued on page 23