Alex Binkley – The re-opening of South Korea and the Philippines to Canadian beef is the latest bit of good news that’s winning Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz plenty of accolades. There’s no denying he’s logged a lot of air miles trying to improve market access for Canadian farm and food products.
However, we should temper the praise until we see whether these deals along with the end of the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly on wheat and barley sales actually improve the financial position of producers. Add the Canada-European free trade and Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations to the list of developments that deserve close scrutiny to determine their actual results.
Keep in the mind the NFU’s prediction that all the benefits will go to the large corporations that supply inputs to farmers and market their meat and grains. The organization has gathered quite solid data on how that’s happened whenever food commodity prices have climbed in recent years.
While Canadian farmers have little influence on world prices for their commodities, generally positive conditions despite the lousy global economy have them expecting a healthier balance sheet for their operations. They should have plenty of tough questions for Ritz and company if the other segments of the food chain reap all the financial gains. The situation highlights why the CFA emphasizes in its National Food Strategy the need for all links in the food chain to be profitable.
A report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business indicates farmers aren’t counting on market prices alone and are focusing on reducing their operating costs. As they do, they realize that government regulations consume a lot of their time and add a significant financial burden. Responding to the report, Ritz has noted that the government will henceforth require a department or agency to eliminate a regulation for every new one they introduce. A fair start, but that doesn’t begin to address the time consumed by the existing paperwork burden. Repetitive farm visits by federal and provincial inspectors and supplying government over and over again with information it already has gets irksome quickly.
No one is advocating lower food safety or health standards. But federal and provincial governments need to get far more serious about dealing with the impact of their regulatory requirements. This is hardly a new concern. It’s been talked about in Ottawa for decades, but there’s never been enough political will to make it happen. And all the current talk about reducing the size of the federal bureaucracy isn’t going to change that by itself. Growing Forward 2 would be a good starting point.
