The Rural Voice, 2006-01, Page 39News in Agriculture
Gay Lea Foods co-op restructures
membership zones, delegates
A proposal to be considered at the
annual meeting of Gay Lea Foods
Co-operative in January would see
members divided into four zones
across Ontario instead of the two
current zones.
Under the restructuring
recommended by the delegates
advisory committee, Huron and Perth
Counties, currently part of zone one
which covers most of the province
except the Grey -Bruce area, would
become part of the new zone one
which will also include Middlesex,
Lambton, Essex, Kent and Elgin
Counties.
It would mean, said Abe Versteeg,
reporting to the zone one meeting in
Brussels, December 5, that in future
years the zone meeting will not be
held in Brussels but somewhere more
central within the new zone.
Versteeg said part of the purpose
for the change was to more evenly
divide the membership among zones.
Currently zone one has 2,914
members including 1,728 milk -
producing members while zone two
only 1,874 members, 892 of them
producing milk.
In the restructuring, a new zone
two would be created, centred on
Waterloo, Wellington and Oxford
counties. Part of the rationale for the
changes is to encourage more
members to join Gay Lea and with
1165 milk producers in this area,
there's the potential for a substantial
membership growth.
The old zone two becomes zone
three, covering Bruce, Grey, Simcoe,
York, Durham and Kawartha Lakes.
Just as the northern Huron -Perth area
will no longer be the centre for Gay
Lea activities in zone one, Grey and
Bruce will likely no longer host the
annual zone meeting for this region.
This zone will also lose several
delegates because of the loss of
members in the area.
Lying behind the restructuring is
the desire to make greater inroads
among producers in eastern Ontario
and a new zone four will cover
eastern and northern Ontario. Most
members in that region are currently
in the Kemptville and Ottawa area.
Delegates to the annual meeting
will also consider a proposal that
would mean that only farmer
producers can be voting members in
future. The move, explained John
Ellison, a director from Listowel, is
designed to keep producers in control
of the co-op. Non -producer
members, would become preferred
shareholders who would have a
guaranteed return on their investment
but wouldn't have voting privileges.
One audience member argued this
broke with the co-op principle of one
member/one vote, urging the board
to poll investor -members to see how
they will regard their future
investments in the co-op if the
proposal goes through.
Producers would also be required
to boost their holdings to three shares
for every 1,000 Litres of production to
qualify as members. If they do not
have this level of investment, their
patronage dividends will be invested
in shares until the minimum limit
was reached.
In elections, Stuart Steckle,
currently Gay Lea board chair, was
returned by acclamation as director
for the zone one. Acclaimed as
delegates were: Bill Reid, Gerald
Johnson, Abe Versteeg, Ignaz Good,
Janet Boot, Glen Herlick, Dave
Hawthorn and Jack Kuipers.
Farmers won't be able to
keep seed with terminator
gene, Slater says
Continued from page 34
cannot reproduce themselves, the
biotechnology and seed corporations,
with co-operation from governments,
have completely disconnected the
growing of food from the rhythm and
cycles of nature. In addition, it
threatens our seed, and ultimately,
our food security by forcing farmers
to purchase seed each year."0
AgriTech
Protecting our
flocks
Janice
Becker is a
computer
enthusiast
and
journalist
living near
Walton, ON.
For two years, we have watched
the devastation in Asia, heard reports
of tens of thousands of birds being
mass slaughtered and shook our
heads when another person died after
becoming infected with Avian
Influenza, the bird flu or
scientifically, H5N 1.
Just this fall, reports filtered out
that the bird flu had now spread
westward into Europe, affecting
mostly wild bird populations and
backyard operations in Russia,
Turkey, Romania and Croatia.
British Columbia has been twice
hit with bird flu outbreaks, though
not the same highly pathogenic
threat that ravaged the East. Still,
thousands of birds were destroyed to
eliminate any threat (perceived or
real) to the Canadian food supply.
While this is understandably a
tremendous tragedy for those farmers
directly affected, perception can
have a widespread effect on the
'industry, as witnessed after the "mad
cow" incident, as consumers, at
home and abroad, react to news
reports.
It is the responsibility of all
consumers to be aware of the
products they choose at the local
grocery store, but those choices
should be made with as much
information as is available. And
information is the original purpose of
the internet.
When looking for material on
Avian Influenza, I started at the
OMAFRA site to see what the
government was offering. There is an
update for veterinarians on the
current situation in this province.
There is information for operators
and employees of poultry facilities
on how to increase the biosecurity,
JANUARY 2006 35