The Rural Voice, 1987-11, Page 20THE PART-
TIME FARMER
AND THE AGRICULTURAL COMMUNITY
Once upon a time, the complaints were common: part-time farmers practise
bad husbandry, they boost land prices, they stop full-time farmers from getting
established orexpanding, they have the luxury of producing ata loss, andthey
erode rural values. Today, attitudes have changed, but then so have the
circumstances in the rural community...
Nof long ago, a part-time
farmer who didn't have to
work off the farm could
count on a certain amount of hostility
from some of his rural neighbours.
As the saying goes, "They borrow
equipment, lose tools, grow weeds,
and seduce our
daughters."
But that's been
changing, partly
because, as the
statistics go, more
than 150,000
Canadian family
farms have dis-
appeared since 1966
(as of the 1981 cen-
sus), and those that
remain are operated
by a higher propor-
tion of part-time
farmers. In Ontario
between 1961 and
1981, close to 39,000
census farms disap-
peared. Of those left,
only a third depend on farming
or most of their income.
"Part-time," of course, includes a
range of farmers, from those who top
up their farm income to those who
earn most of their money off the farm.
In a study published this year by
Heather Clemenson and Ray Bollman
of Statistics Canada, a "strict full-time
farmer" was an operator of a census -
farm under 65 years of age who re-
ported farming as the major occupa-
tion, who reported less than 96 days of
off -farm work, who reported positive
net farm income, and whose net farm
income was the major income source.
A "strict full-time non-farm" operator
was defined as someone under 65 who
reported a non-farm occupation, who
census farmers report some off -farm
work. And the income Canadian
farmers as a whole get from off -farm
sources exceeds their net income from
farming operations.
But let's leave the definitions for a
time. If the number of farmers with
two incomes has
been increasing
steadily for the
past 30 years, it's
germane to ask
why. And part of
the answer is
simple: severe
economic stress.
Many farmers,
especially in
recent years, have
had to seek off -
farm work just to
keep the farm
going in a period
of high costs and
low returns. "It's
one of the ways
that farmers are
surviving," notes Paul Klopp,
president of the Huron County
Federation of Agriculture. "It's a sad
state of affairs in a business that
should have enough work at home."
But even those farmers not forced
to work off the farm to make ends
meet have turned to outside employ-
ment. As T. K. Warley, professor of
agricultural economics at the Univer-
sity of Guelph, puts it "Part-time
farming is in practice becoming a sort
Working off the farm is
"one of the ways that
farmers are surviving,"
says Paul Klopp,
president of the Huron
County Federation of
Agriculture, "It's a
sad state of affairs
in a business that
should have enough
work at home."
for all
reported more than 96 days of off -
farm work, and whose net farm
income was not the major source of
income.
According to the study, farming
was the major occupation for 61 per
cent of all census -farm operators in
1981. In 1971, the figure was 64 per
cent. In other words, less than two-
thirds of census -farm operators report
farming to be their major occupation.
In fact, more than half of Canada's
18 THE RURAL VOICE