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QUEEN'S BUSH RURALMI,NISTRIES
(519) 369-6774
ANNOUNC
T
APPOINTMENT OF NEW CO-ORDINATOR 4
The Board of Directors of Queen's Bush Rural Ministries is pleased to 4
announce the appointment of Mr. Alex Leith, from R.R. #4, Durham, as 1
Co-ordinator of Queen's Bush Rural Ministries. Alex brings a combination 1
of experience, skills and personality to this position that make him 1
especially well suited to assist rural people in finding the help they require 4
to deal with the crises they encounter in their lives or farming operations. 4
Besides being a farmer himself, Alex has extensive experience in working
with rural people in Grey and Bruce through his years of service with the 1
Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and Ontario 1
Federation of Agriculture. Most importantly, he enjoys working with rural 4
people and is committed to listening to them and helping them. 1
Alex replaces Mr. Brian Ireland who resigned recently after 12 years of 1
faithful and conscientious service as Co-ordinator in order to devote more
time to his business enterprises. The Board wishes to express its sincere
appreciation for all that he has done for the people of this area and wishes 1
him well. 1
Alex Leith may be contacted, either for further information or for
assistance, by calling the Queen's Bush Rural Ministries referral line at 1
519-369-6774. 1
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24 THE RURAL VOICE
• to identify emerging issues that will
affect agricultural and rural sectors
and work with stakeholders to
resolve them
• to co-ordinate the resources of the
ministry and market them to the agri-
food sector and rural communities
• to help form partnerships, coalitions
and networks to ensure information
and advances are shared and issues
resolved.
The job involves some aspects of
the old Ag Reps job that Ball held
down, in the way he is to be the eyes
and ears of the Ministry within the
community through meetings with
rural stakeholders and as he functions
as OMAFRA's public face. But the
mandate is much broader, says
Carlow. Anything that affects the
rural economy, not just agriculture,
will be part of the mandate of the
regional information co-ordinators.
Their job is to help find ways to
allow economic growth to continue
in rural Ontario, he says.
It will be their job to see local
issues emerging, Carlow says. He
gives as an example the rural/urban
split that developed in southern
Huron over large livestock operations
as an example. A regional
information co-ordinator's job in
such a case would be to get a handle
on the situation before it became a
major issue. "By bringing people
together we can work at finding a
solution."
But one of the major contributions
of Ag Reps over the years has been
helping local farm communities deal
with crises, from the pork price
collapse on a province -wide basis to
local catastrophes like the eastern
Ontario ice storm. How will
OMAFRA deal with situations like
that in the future?
The work partnership comes up
again in Carlow's answer. When
regional information co-ordinators
like Ball see an issue developing,
their task will be to pull together
partnerships to find the solution, he
says.
In the meantime, the job of Ball
and Muegge and Barrie and the
others is to get to know the
stakeholders in the rural communities
and develop their trust. If they can
succeed, Ball says, they can start
dealing with issues before they
become issues.0