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12 THE RURAL VOICE
HOW LONG WILL
FARMERS TAKE IT?
Gord Wainman has been an urban -
based agriculture reporter for 13 years.
Grant Devine came hat in hand
recently to Canada's financial altar,
imploring the bishops of Bay Street
banking to show mercy to farmers.
"We're facing economic war in
Saskatchewan," he told the agriculture
committee of the bankers' association.
The Conservative premier warned
that 20,000 farmers — a third of
Saskatchewan's total — face financial
ruin unless they get an immediate cash
bailout of $500 million.
He fingered the subsidy war be-
tween the EEC and the U.S. as a major
cause of casualties among Canadian
grain farmers caught in the crossfire.
But it isn't just Saskatchewan
reeling. The Ontario Corn Producers
Association has yelled "me too!"
The association's annual meeting
was told of an alarming increase in
inquiries from insolvent fanners made
to the Farm Debt Review Board.
"There's a severe situation in parts
of southwestern Ontario ... a situation
very much like that in Saskatchewan,"
said association director and Debt
Review Board member Fred Lewis.
"A lot of people are led to believe
that the situation is not as severe here,
but it is, and this must be brought to
the government's attention."
Three weeks later, the OCPA
released findings that income (net
margin times marketings) has plunged
to 28 per cent of pre -1985 levels.
And to top off the Ontario situa-
tion, agriculture minister David Ram-
say, like Devine, was to meet recently
with senior bankers to beg mercy.
So what does this all mean?
First, it means the decade-long
farm Depression of the 1980s is blow-
ing at gale force into the 1990s.
The most recent census in 1986
showed that from 1980 to 1986 farm
numbers decreased 7.9 per cent across
Canada, and the number of people on
them decreased 13 per cent. By 1988,
only 175,000 commercial farm
families remained on the land — the
equivalent of Calgary's population.
Second, it tells me that politicians
continue to fail to find solutions. As
for their willingness to grovel at the
feet of bankers, politicians have done
this for 10 years. All they have to
show for it are sore knees.
Third, and most important, it tells
me that farmers just don't have the
guts to stand shoulder to shoulder and
demand a halt to the slaughter.
And that slaughter ain't over yet.
There are no numbers, but given the
alarm being sounded in Saskatchewan,
the country's second -richest farm
province, and Ontario, the richest, the
'91 census should be a humdinger.
At a time when Canadian agricul-
ture is suffering heavy casualties on
world markets because of protectionist
subsidies abroad, how does the
Canadian government respond?
It issues a "Green Paper" on the
agri-food industry which would take
away from Canadian farmers protec-
tion that European and U.S. govern-
ments are piling on their farmers.
Harvard political scientist Robert
Paarlberg told Ontario corn producers
to expect little or no change this year
in the subsidy -rich U.S. Farm Bill.
And Paarlberg noted that George
Bush can speak with forked tongue.
At the same time that Bush urges the
rest of the world to eliminate trade
subsidies, he increases U.S. export
subsidies by 37 per cent — to $900
million this year from $566 million.
Back in Ottawa, what do we have?
Mazankowski is pushing his Green
Paper, ironically called "Growing
Together," while Canadian agriculture
is dying. In it, he asks Canadian
farmers to become "more market
responsive" and "more self-reliant."
I ask myself how much longer
Canadian farmers will take being
suckered by their governments and
farm leaders. I don't like the answer.0