The Rural Voice, 1988-08, Page 8//UI 1 -41.1-
,
CROPS UPDATE
Centralia Research — Demonstration Farm
4 Km north of CCAT Campus
Wednesday, August 24, 1988
9:30 a.m. — 3:30 p.m.
NOON HOUR PROGRAM
12:00 noon LUNCH AVAILABLE
12:30 p.m. "Market Forecasts" featuring guest
speakers Brian Doidge, Market Analyst
Sheila Anderson, Ontario Bean
Producers Marketing Board
OPTIONAL PRESENTATIONS:
9:30 a.m. 11:45 a.m. 1:30 p.m.— 3:30 p.m.
SPEAKERS 1. Weed Control Strategies — Jim O'Toole
2. Which Bean Variety? — John Heard
3. Earth Shattering Tools — Peter Johnson
4. Bacterial Blight — Bob Forrest
5. Winter Wheat Planting — Rick Upfold
6. Insects in Corn — Tom Hartman
7. Winter Rapeseed Production — Joan
McKinley
8. Crops — On Farm Weather Recording —
Brand Schneller
9. Fall Management of Alfalfa — Harvey
Wright
10. Rutabagas — Bruce Brolley
EXHIBITS: 1. Conservation Tillage Equipment
2. Machinery Displays
Ministry of
Agnculture
and Food
ONTARIO
Jack Riddell Minister
CENTRALIA
COLLEGE
Huron Palk Onlano NOY tYO
(511) 228 6891
6 THE RURAL VOICE
FEEDBACK
grain cartels, lending institutions, or
bailiff receivers. It was intended to
point out the continuing violence
forced on Canada's rural communities,
and it docs not need or deserve judge-
ment by reporters who fail to under-
stand that there is a huge problem.
I would like to make one more
point on why things are the way they
are. Protest after protest over the past
five years has pointed out that govern-
ment, banks, and farmers have gotten
themselves into a situation where
many farmers' debts cannot be paid.
Under the current government of
Brian Mulroney and with John Wise
as agriculture minister, the federal
Farm Debt Review Board has been set
up to solve this problem.
John Wise has stated that this Act
is to keep as many farmers on the farm
as possible, to which I answer, "Read
me that section." Does solving the
problem mean processing the final few
of that two-thirds of farmers who have
to go to make the 1990 model a fact?
I submit that the same powers, more
deeply entrenched, that dictated the
1969 task force on agriculture, are
pulling the strings today.
I have before me the Farm Debt
Review Board's Annual Report —
1987, and am interested in the statis-
tics regarding "activity." I prefer to
use Ontario and I quote for the period
August 5, 1986 to December 31, 1987.
Of 1,592 farmers who were served
with Notices of Intent by creditors,
1,110 applied to the review board; 691
applications were completed. It is
important to note that on the next page
the 691 applications completed are
made up of 86 withdrawn, 7 rejected,
342 no arrangement possible, 256
arrangements (signed or identified).
This last figure of 256 must be the
one that staffers of the board and our
agriculture minister continue to hoax
us with as 65 to 77 per cent success
rates. Of the original 1,592 we have
Lost all but 256 through some sort of
crack; generously I will state that 16
per cent were processed into some sort
of arrangement. I understand from
knowledgeable sources that there are
many in that 256 that have not been
signed and that being identified means
that at least one of three panelists feels
that everuually there may be an