Third party review of Business Risk Management program fails to define “equal treatment” or to examine defined needs of farmers.
Canadian farmers concerned with the Agricultural Policy Framework and the Business Risk Management program it offers, are no closer to reaching a solution with officials at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.
We watched the April 1 deadline for the implementation of the Business Risk Management program come and go with no movement by Ag Canada’s officials. Then we agreed to a third-party review of the proposed program, expecting such a review would disclose the inadequacies of the program.
Unfortunately the terms of reference applied to the third-party review failed to examine the critical aspects of the safety net proposal compared to the clearly defined needs outlined by farmers and their organizations across Canada – key questions were deliberately excluded from the review. This has frustrated the Canadian Federation of Agriculture and the National Safety Nets Advisory Committee.
It is becoming increasingly difficult to have any faith in the Ag Canada officials involved in this process. Farmers and their organizations have spent hours and hours reviewing the proposed Business Risk Management programs, seeking something that would meet the needs of farmers across Canada.
We have also spent a lot of time developing proposals that would satisfy the safety net needs of our farmers and then putting those recommendations before Ag Canada Minister Vanclief and his staff. This approach to achieving suitable safety net protection for our farmers is continually being ignored by government officials.
Several weeks ago an electronic petition was produced and thousands of farmers sent the petition to Members of Parliament in Ottawa – so many in fact that the email system in Ottawa crashed more than once.
Now we have found out that the actual copy of that petition, demanding Parliament keep the current Net Income Stabilization Account program in effect until a proper replacement is designed, tested and accepted by farmers, has not been delivered to the House of Commons as promised.
Farmers are already putting seeds in the ground for the 2003 crop without an acceptable safety net program in place. They expect us to believe that acceptable terms will be written into the new NISA program. This is not the way Canadian farmers want to do business, especially when we have seen repeated instances of dealing in bad faith by our Federal Government on this topic.
As part of the third-party review, we expected to see the government’s definition of equal treatment explained. Farmers across Canada have a wide diversity of growing conditions and cropping practices, yet the proposed safety net program wants to provide the same treatment for all.
We understand equal treatment to mean similar program terms for farmers facing similar risk situations. The proposed Business Risk Management program doesn’t provide such equal treatment. Unfortunately, the third-party review of the program used the government’s position and defined equal treatment as identical programs. This just isn’t acceptable.
Farmers and their organizations across Canada believe their proposal for a workable safety net program has not been evaluated in a meaningful way. This situation is becoming increasingly serious and the Ontario Federation of Agriculture is prepared to propose further actions to demonstrate the industry’s frustration to government.
~Bill Mailloux~
Vice-President, Ontario Federation of Agriculture