The Rural Voice, 1992-05, Page 10Martin Mills Inc.
Lucknow Division
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6 THE RURAL VOICE
DOES ANYBODY
STUDY HISTORY?
Keith Roulston, a newspaper publisher
and playwright who lives near Blyth,
is the originator and publisher of The
Rural Voice.
I suppose if you study econom-
ics, some of the things farm eco-
nomics professors are saying these
days make sense, but if you study
history, it can make you shake your
head.
There was the proposal, a few
years back, that farmers should
become franchisees, buying a
franchise from a corporation that
would provide the land and buy the
product while the farmer provided the
labour.
As well, quite frequently
nowadays, you hear the prediction
that farmers are going to have to
learn to get along without owning
land and should just be tenants.
I agree it makes sense in some
circumstances that farmers should
rent land, rather than buying it. If
you're just starting out, you have to
lay out a lot less money if you can
rent land. Few merchants build a
store before they open a shop. Few
manufacturers buy a factory when
they can rent one and save their
precious start-up capital for other
unexpected needs. So if a person
wants to get into farming, it makes
sense to rent crop land, even
buildings if they're available.
But for farmers, unlike other
businesses, renting seems like a
short term solution. Most farmers
want to own their own land so they
can plan for the future. Farmers who
own land are more likely to manage it
well than those who work rented land
over the years. And farmers who own
land are likely to be more indepen-
dent than farmers who depend on a
landlord.
The thing that worries me about
this vision of a future where farmers
don't own the land they work on is
that it's so much like the past our
forefathers came to North America to
escape. I'm always astounded when I
read about the hardships pioneers
suffered to cross the Atlantic in the
cattle holds of boats to think people
would put themselves through that
misery. When I stand in the middle
of a bush and survey all the trees
around me and think about starting
to clear that land with only an axe, I
shake my head in disbelief at what
my great-grandfather went through
when he settled in Kinloss township
in the 1850s. In the cold of winter
when I shiver in my centrally -heated
brick house, I can't even begin to
imagine what life was like for the
men, women and children living in
the primitive first log shanties.
Yet these people suffered it
willingly for the goal of having their
own land. They faced the terror of
the unknown, rather than the sad
life they knew of living as tenant
farmers.
Oh yes, modern thinkers will say,
but things are different now. Maybe.
I admit that most farmers who rent
land today rent it from other farmers:
neighbours or farmers who have
retired to town. If the concept takes
hold, however, I wonder how long it
will be before wealthy people see
renting land to farmers as a secure
way to invest. I notice that many of
the world's revolutions involve a
drive for land reform: to get the
ownership of land out of the hands of
the few and into the hands of the
many. In the Philippines, 20 per cent
of the people own 80 per cent of the
land.
It seems to me the fallacy of the
idea of an agriculture based on rented
land is like the fallacy of the
franchise farming idea: it sees
farmers as sources of labour working
with someone else's capital. It also
ignores a long history that shows
farming is only successful where
farmers own their own land.0