The Rural Voice, 1987-12, Page 10SEE OUR MINIATURE
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8 THE RURAL VOICE
"PUNDITS": LOOKING
BACK AT THE NEW YEAR
Christmas is coming, and the sea-
son is here for the so-called experts to
tell us what's in store for the new year.
Agriculture, of course, has always
had its pundits, but this year they
appear to be more in evidence.
It must have something to do with
the depression in agriculture, which
for some is entering its ninth year.
The added spectre of free trade
with the U.S. now also looms over
some farm sectors.
While free trade detractors such
as the grape growers have pulled no
punches in their objections, the free
trade salesmen were out in force at
two farm outlook meetings, the late
October Ontario Agri -Food confer-
ence and the early November Can-
adian Bankers' Association "farming
in transition" conference.
Like a Yankee carpetbagger of old,
Canada's ambassador to the U.S.,
Allan Gotlieb, flew into Toronto from
Washington to open his bag of free -
trade remedies.
When I asked Gotlieb in an inter-
view prior to his speech at the Agri -
Food conference if he didn't find it
ludicrous that he, a Canadian diplomat
to a foreign country, found himself
selling the free trade package to far-
mers in his own land. Gotlieb got
quite chippy, insisting he wasn't
"selling" free trade, but rather talking
about "Canada -U.S. relations."
Of course when he got into his
speech, he sold the deal hard as
Canada's salvation against the rising
tide of U.S. protectionism. With little
humility, Gotlieb said: "I've been
talking about this for six years ...
about U.S. protectionism ... a great
danger to Canada ... I think I was the
first to say it in the whole country.
I've been right and I'm still right."
Thanks Al, but Canadian
agriculture has been well aware of the
Yankee trader's big stick for decades.
A week later at the banking con-
ference, the boys from Bay Street
came out baying barrier -free trade and
along with it calling for the elim-
ination of farm subsidies both on the
bilateral and multi -lateral levels.
Tom Cowan, Putnam farmer and
vice-president of Cold Springs Agri -
Services Ltd., seemed the lone voice
urging caution in farm subsidy elim-
ination that first day of the conference.
"We don't want our farmers to lose
by default," he said.
But it was Robert McIntosh,
president of the bankers' association,
who led the charge for elimination on
a world-wide basis.
"In the past year, many world
govemments have recognized that
farm subsidy policies make no sense
and must be reformed ... Must Canada
spend more money than it can afford,
knowing that, whatever the amount, it
will be attacked as not enough?" he
asked in his prepared speech.
"Practically no agricultural com-
modity of any importance is free from
the effects of government interven-
tion," he complained, "The pervasive-
ness of this assistance is due to the
fact that once a government assists
some commodity sectors, pressures
emerge which lead to assistance in
other sectors."
It wasn't mentioned that the
bailout of Dome Petroleum was in
effect what many consider a bailout of
Canadian banks. Nor were the bail-
outs of Third World debtor nations,
which many consider bailouts of
Canadian and U.S. banks, mentioned.
In the controversy surrounding the
Canada -U.S. pact, some bankers have
complained that they got the short end
of the stick with American bankers.
But on general principle, folks,
free trade is good for us.
At least that seems to be the
message from the same boys who
helped bring us bankruptcy in Brazil
who played their part in Black
Monday on the Bay Street stock
market in October.0
GORD WAINMAN HAS BEEN AN
URBAN -BASED AGRICULTURE
REPORTER FOR 12 YEARS.