The Rural Voice, 1980-09, Page 16Centralia
graduates
FIVE YEARS LATER
BY ADRIAN VOS
WITH RESEARCH BY DONNA THIEL
AND GISELE IRELAND
Skilled people are in short supply in
all sectors of Canadian industry.
Governments and industrialists have
been urging everyone else to do
something about the lack of competent
'workers.
For a time this lack could be filled by
trnmigrants, but it has become more
and more difficult to attract foreign
labor, due to increased prosperity in the
supplying countries and the lagging
Canadian economy.
In agriculture, training on the job has
been a way of life for centuries and the
need for better education in order to
improve one's income has not been
stressed till recently.
It used to be that an agricultural
graduate, with a B.Sc. from university,
or with a diploma from a college, moved
immediately to industry. Almost all
older ag graduates became attached to
feed or fertilizer companies or are now
civil servants with Agriculture Canada
or OMAF.
The last five to ten years has seen a
change in the attitudes of the grads.
Most are now using the skills they've
learned to run an actual farm. Skills not
considered to be necessary a short ten
years ago.
Gerald Kolkman, who graduated in
1974, from Centralia College of Agricul-
tural Technology, bought a 100 -acre
farm three years later. in Logan
township in Perth County.
As in every business he needed a
down payment and in the three year gap
he earned money as a trucker for Stacey
Bros. Dairy Products,
Kolkman bought his farm with a
mortgage from Farm Credit Corporta-
tion (FCC) and feels that he would have
had difficulties obtaining the loan if it
wasn't for his formal education.
Today he has 90 sows and he sells all
the weaned pigs. It is not profitable, he
asserts.
Not all grads are males. Carol
Coughlin of RR1, Atwood, graduated in
1973
fhe first yeat out she worked as a
typist and file clerk for the Friesian
Association of Canada.
It is much more difficult for a girl to
get a farm related job than it is for a
boy. After applying to several jobs that
were farm related, she got a job with
Bob Miller Photography in Waterdown.
She is a secretary there and is now
taking courses in photography so she'll
be able to photograph farm animals at
fairs and shows.
Both these grads agree that a
college education gives a person a more
rounded education, something that
can't be gained through short courses,
however valuable they may be.
Kolkman says flatly that a farm boy
educated on the farm and with addition-
al short courses ends up with bits and
pieces.
Coughlin is more careful and says a
farm boy could get the same education
by practical experience and courses.
"But", she says, "the social aspects (of
a college course) are just as important.
This helps us operate in the world
outside college."
The Ontario Agricultural College
keeps close records on the directions
their grads take. It found that in the last
ten years, graduates returning to the
farm increased from nine per cent to 26
per cent.
Among college grads who farm are
Robert and Phyllis Hammell of RR#1
Tara, in Bruce County.
Phyllis didn't encounter any difficult-
ies obtaining a farm job. She married
Bob and as every farm wife knows,
being married to a farmer is more than a
full time job.
Both graduated from Centralia in
1973, Bob in agricultural business
management and Phyllis in home
economics.
Immediately Bob got the responsibil-
ity of running a farm. His dad had died
the previous year and he managed the
farm for his mother. In 1975 he bought
the 150 acre farm from his mother and
married Phyllis.
She had been the field representative
in Bruce county for the Ontario
Federation of Agriculture until that
time.
Bob says that it is not easy to make
a decent living off the farm. The
Hammells feed beef cattle on contract
and are paid according to the pounds
gained. To buy his own beef is too
expensive with today's interest rates,
this farm business manager asserts.
Bob would like to work on the farm all
the time, but he finds that he needs an
off -farm job in the wintertime to make
ends meet. From fall to spring he works
for a firm of chartered accountants.
The Hammells think that a college
education is needed for today's farmers.
Bob doesn't think that it such a good
idea to depend on father's experience.
The older people are set in their ways
PG. 14 THE RURAL VOICE/SEPTEMBER 1980
and often resistant to new ways of doing
things. Short courses are good, mainly
because they help keep a farmer
up-to-date on new developments. This
applies to the college-educated farmer
as well as the one who relies on practical
experience.
He thinks that large farms have more
of a future because they have the capital
to expand and to modernize continuous-
ly. For the same reason he thinks that
small farms, 150 to 200 acres, are
becoming more backward.
Nevertheless, if he had his
druthers, he would prefer the smaller
farm.One advantage of the small farms
is that they are more solvent, while the
big ones are debt ridden.
But the trouble with the small farm is
that a person has to work outside in
order to augment his income. That
means that the partner must be
available to do the chores.
Kolkman grows 54 acres of corn and
36 acres of alfalfa on his 100 acres, and
keeps close records of his production in
barn and on the field. He is able to rent
machinery from his father at custom
rates, which helps to keep capital
investment down.
Like Hammell, Kolkman thinks that a
small farm is beautiful, but that it
should return a decent income.
HYBRID
GILTS
YORK—LANDRACE CROSS
can supply in large orders.
Also
PUREBRED LANDRACE
BOARS
and CROSSBRED BOARS.
1
BRANDY POINT
FARMS
Willy and Kurt Keller
RR#1, Mitchell
519-348-9753 or 34S-8043