The Rural Voice, 1978-03, Page 3COMPLETE
FARM
PROTECTION
FOR YOUR:
• Farm Home
• Private Garage
• Family Property
• Additional Living Expenses after a Disaster
• Faim Buildings
• Farm Machinery, Equipment and Supplies
• Farm Produce and Livestock
• Liability for Injury and Property Damage
Clams
PROTECTS YOUR
/
lalt
HOME
111
FARM BUILDINGS
1
411Ple‘
LIVESTOCK
OA
EQUIPMENT
i it
PRODUCE
IS
SECURITY
FROM LIABILITY
J
ELMA MUTUAL FIRE
INSURANCE CO.
HEAD OFFICE - ATWOOD
356-2582
Opinion
Let's work together
In recent years it has seemed that the•farmer has become more
and more isolated in his bid for a decent break from society.
Politicians. in the main, have turned against them, because
the farm vote is no longer large enough to have real power in the
majority of ridings. The press, the urban variety at any rate,
seems either to misunderstand, or deliberately misrepresent
farm problems. It often seems to farmers that they are all alone
and a certain paranoia has built up in the farm community.
But while they are fighting their battle seemingly by
themselves. a very similar battle is being fought by another
segment of society where the family has been the traditional
base. Until recently the plight of the small business in Canada
has gone almost unnoticed. The tradition of organization in the
farm community goes back a long time. Organization among
small businessmen has been non-existent. Such organizations as
the Chamber of Commerce have, at the upper level. been
dominated by big businesses. Only with the birth of the
Canadian Federation of Independent Business has there been a
voice to say that there is a difference between big business and
small business.
We've had a tendency to lump all businessmen together, to
treat the guy who runs the corner store the same way we treat
the president of General Motors. But the vast majority are small
family businesses facing many of the same problems that the
small family farm faces, being caught in a cost -price squeeze,
finding it hard to keep young people involved in the business
because of increasingly small rewards for the long hours and the
strain of being in business for oneself.
There is a great deal of similarity between the small
businessman (particularly in small towns) and the family farm`
yet both have tended to ignore the other. Bath continue to fight
their lonely battles when really they have a common cause: the
belief that big is not necessarily better and that the family unit is
still a viable unit in society.
The odds are stacked against both groups if they continue to
fight alone. Neither has the political clout to gain its demands. It
v. ould seem time that they got together a little more to
co-operate in efforts where their causes overlap. We need both
the family business and the family farm. If they don't hang
together they may both hang separately.
the rural
Voice
Keith and Jill Houlston, Co -Publishers.
Published monthly by Squire Publishing House,
RR 3, Blyth, Ont. NOM 1HO.
Telephone 523-9636.
Subscription Rates: Canada, $2.00; Outside Canada, $3.00;
Single copy, 25 cents.
Editor: Keith Roulston.
Authorized as second class mail by Canada Post Office.
Registration number 3560.
THE RURAL VOICE/MARCH 1978, PG. 3.