The Rural Voice, 2000-06, Page 27e-mail.
"I think for the most part we're in
good shape," he says.
Templeman, for one, is aware of
the potential for problems. "We're
going to have to work very hard on
areas outside Stratford," he says. He
points out that the crops team comes
from a wide background to represent
different geographical and climatic
conditions. Reid knows the shorter -
season area in Grey, Bruce and
Llufferin. Payne knows
the conditions of eastern
Ontario. Johnson comes
more from the southwest.
All of them will have
to keep up their contacts
from their old areas,
Templeman says, in
order, to stay on top of
the situation across the
province.
And staying in touch
with producers is still
very much part of the
plan, according to
Carlow. The specialists
have established contacts
in the community,
particularly with leading
edge farmers, which tend
to be the larger scale
farmers, he says. What will be
missing, he admits, is the old one-on-
one contacts with ordinary farmers.
And that's a worry Templeman
has. "People assume we're not in
business," he says. The feeling is that
OMAFRA is distancing itself from
the average producer, he says.
In Perth County the new
OMAFRA vision is particularly
difficult to deliver because of the
large Old Order Mennonite
community, Templeman says. Most
people in this group don't even have
telephones, let alone computers. Still,
he says, the Old Order community
tends to be a self-contained group
that often didn't seek information
from OMAFRA anyway.
Despite expressing doubts,
Templeman says "The plan is laid
out and it's our responsibility to
make it work. We'll give 'er a good
spin and see what happens."
The reduction in client calls has
been the major change in
Templeman's days compared to a
year ago. Hall agrees that a year ago
he would have been spending much
of his day working on individual
recommendations to solve farmers'
problems. Specific crop production
or management issues or questions
from municipalities about the weed
act would take up a major part of the
day.
The questions that specialists do
get will tend to be tough ones, says
Hall, ones where there's no
information in print. Easier questions
will now be answered by the call
opportunities.
Because the specialists will have
less contact with the public on a day-
to-day basis, they'll have more time
to devote to gathering information
such as connecting with key
researchers at University of Guelph
or Ridgetown College.
A new product has come on the
market, for instance, to battle
fusarium in winter wheat. OMAFRA
is hoping to work with Ridgetown
and others to undertake field
demonstrations of the product.
There will be more partnerships
between agri-business,
researchers and OMAFRA, he
predicts.
While the crops team is the
major focus of the Stratford
office, there are other specialists.
Ed Barrie, formerly a swine
systems and behaviour specialist
in the Stratford office, stays on as
swine sow -nursery specialist
while Ron Lackey is feed
ingredients and by-products
specialist and Jim Weeden is an
engineer specializing in the rural
environment.
Over in Clinton, the focus is
more on livestock. John Bancroft,
formerly Ag Rep in Perth, is now
a swine grower -finisher specialist
while the position of beeflot
specialist hasn't yet been filled.
Harold House remains in Clinton as
an engineer specializing in dairy and
beef structures. Colin Reesor,
formerly in Walkerton, has been
moved to Clinton as Commodity
Marketing Program Lead.
The other new aspect of the
offices is the position of regional
information co-ordinator. Former
Huron Ag Rep Daryl Ball fills that
position in Stratford while Jane
Muegge takes on that job in Clinton.
Andrew Barrie holds that office in
Markdale and Gerry Horst, in Fergus.
In all there are 16 regional
information co-ordinators spread
across the province.
Their job, says Daryl Ball, is:
• to provide timely information,
based on local conditions, through
media releases, articles and speaking
engagements
• to help increase awareness in the
agri-food community of emerging
trends and technologies in rural
Ontario
Dan Carlow Daryl Ball
Familiar faces in new jobs in new OMAFRA structure.
centre.
One of the changes is that
OMAFRA staff will work much
more closely with agri-business. Hall
says one of the ways they'll keep up
with what's going on in the field is
through regular contact with
agricultural dealers. Those same
dealers will also be used, along with
the media and OMAFRA's
Agriphone system, to get information
out to the farming public.
Each of the crop specialists will
also be working with a regional Soil
and Crop Improvement Association.
It's one of the tools that's been put in
place that many people don't know
about, says Templeman. A new grant
structure helps support Soil and Crop
on a regional basis, rather than the
old county organizations. Hall, for
instance, will now be working with
Huron, Perth, Wellington and
Waterloo.
His area of specialty also includes
identity preserved crops and organic
farming. He'll be working, for
example, with the canola association
on trials, programs and educational
JUNE 2000 23