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The Rural Voice, 1991-09, Page 78GREY 446 10th St., Hanover, Ontario N4N 1P9 519-364-3050 The Rural Voice is provided to all Grey County Farmers by the GCFA. County Federation of Agriculture NEWSLETTER MILLIONS FOR FARMERS: IF ONLY IT WERE TRUE Did you ever notice that any time the government puts money into a farm program, the total amount makes the headline on the front page of the paper? Then in smaller print somewhere in the article it sometimes tells how it breaks down to the individual farmer, but not always. So all the public remembers is that farmers are getting more of their tax dollar. A classic example of this is the $8.8 billion story that made the front page of most papers in Canada last fall. You remember the story — reporters who didn't know the first thing about the agriculture sector suddenly became experts on the subject. They threw around words like "sub- sidy" and catch phrases like "Canadian farmers milking the consumers" and "all Canadians are made to cough up money to ensure Canada has more farm- ers than it needs." Then the politicians got into it. John Crosbie told the House of Commons: "The Minister of Agriculture should be ashamed at the amount of assistance he is giving to Canadian farmers." The sad part is, farmers only received $2.8 bil- lion of the $8.8 billion spent on the agriculture sector. It's too bad it hadn't been $8.8 billion paid to farmers, as the money would put them closer to the U.S. and ECC farmers' incomes. Another example of poor media coverage on agriculture programs is the province's $50 million interest relief program, which had such stringent qualifications that it's impossible to obtain for most. Not much was said about the program but a great deal was said about the amount it was costing the taxpayer. A more recent example is the $8 million dollar payout under the Ontario Farm Insurance Stabilization Plan, which works out to a measly $3.53 per tonne for winter wheat. The inadequa- cies of those payouts were not brought ouL A number of weeks ago, our local paper carried a story on the front page 74 THE RURAL VOICE where the headline read "Farm income up this year, but prices still low." The actual figures do show an ex- pected rise of eight per cent in income over the past year. What it fails to bring out is that farm net income dropped 28 per cent last year. It especially made me angry at the time it was written — just as Ontario farm leaders were declaring a "state of emergency" and thousands of cash croppers in Ontario are being forced to leave farming. The consumer sure has a hard time believing it's an emergency in the farm community when there are articles like these printed on the front pages. There are many good articles in the farm pa- pers, but it's like preaching to the con- verted. Some of these stories need to be in some urban papers also. The OFA has been geeing some excellent media coverage on the state of emergency tour. But it takes time to convince people how serious the prob- lem is. We need to educate the consumer to understand that agriculture is creating 20 per cent of the jobs in Ontario. The dying agricultural sector not only in- creases unemployment, but forces ex - farmers to be the biggest job stealers in the province. The consumer must also learn that GCFA REGIONAL MEETING Tues, September 101 1991 Markdale Legion 8:00 p.m. Speaker: Jack Wilkinson OFA 1st Vice President CFA 2nd Vice President Ontario and Canada have some of the highest standards for food safety and quality in the world. It's also the fresh- est! Our friends in the Niagara federa- tion have the right idea by putting up signs on both sides of the border reading "buy the best — Ontario." Will the consumer realize (through the help of some proper media) that the food indus- try they have must be saved? Only then can we work together to keep farmers farming in this province for years to come. It's a difficult and slow process, • but I feel the OFA has what it takes to pull it off. In closing, all of those so called jour- nalists who wrote about the huge amount of subsidies Canadian farmers got last year could have some rave re- views if they would interview Roger George and print some real news.0 submitted by Jeff Torrie director, Grey North GCFA DIRECTORS' MEETING Thursday, September 26 OMAF Boardroom Markdale 8:00 p.m. Members are welcome to attend GCFA ANNUAL MEETING Friday, October 18, 1991