by KRISTIAN PARTINGTON
A Canada-wide coalition claiming to represent more than 100,000 grain, oilseed and pulse farmers is voicing its disappointment after Canada’s largest research council announced last week that agriculture will be dropped from its list of priorities.
In a news release issued Friday, Farmers for Investment in Agriculture (FIA,) said the recent decision by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) to eliminate food and agriculture as a strategic priority shows a complete disconnect from the reality of the global food supply, today and into the future.
Public research funding, said Grain Growers of Canada President Stephen Vandervalk, has been on the decline, even as various signs of food shortages have been on display across the globe. These cutbacks “have been slowly working their way through the system,” he says. “We’ve been losing researchers and there really haven’t been any new researchers coming along to fill those gaps, at least here in Western Canada.”
Even so, he describes the NSERC decision as “totally out of the blue.”
Earlier this month the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization warned that a food crisis is imminent as demand outstrips supply on a global scale. It estimates food production must increase by 70 per cent by 2050 to meet the needs of future global populations. FIA believes research is a key component to meeting these future challenges and it’s calling on the NSERC to reconsider its priorities in the allocation of its $1.1 billion budget.
“It’s important to have the private research but it’s equally important to have that public research as well,” said Vandervalk. He’s hopeful the federal government and the council will reverse its decision and look for efficiencies elsewhere.
Producers fund grain and oilseeds research. But Don Kenny, Chair of the Grain Farmers of Ontario, says “farmers have taken existing technology and advanced it as far as we can take it. If we don’t have more research funding then how are we going to move forward…to feed that rising population in 2050? We need the A- base funding increased so we can attract those researchers and keep them working on our issues. Since 1994 it’s been cut, cut, cut…and now for food production to not even be a priority is of grave concern for the industry and society as a whole.”
Like his western colleague, Kenney says he’s optimistic, however, and expects the council will see the error in this decision. “We’ll come at it together and we’ll approach the federal government on this issue, stronger than ever with the 100,000 members we represent with this coalition. Those numbers "gotta count for something.” BF
Comments
Unfortunately, the claim by grain farmers about the dire need for the ability to produce more food, is neutralized by the fact that grain farmers seem equally adamant about the need to use that food for ethanol, instead of for food.
Therefore, when the farm groups claim the funding authority (NSERC) has a "disconnect from reality", the funding authority could easily respond that grains farmers are simply "the pot calling the kettle black".
Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON
AMMMMAN TRUE STATEMENT NO BELIEF IN FARM ORGANIZATIONS TAKE THEIR STABLE FUNDING AND POCKET THE CASH
Remarkable how every topic segues back to the usual rants.
blah blah blah...supply management is bad....blah blah blah ethanol is bad....
If I was even the least-bit wrong, about anything I post, you'd not only prove me wrong, but be proud to identify who you are, instead of hiding behind an electronic veil and "shooting the messenger"
I sign my name to my postings because I'm right - if you knew what you were talking about, and had something to say, you'd be able, and willing, to do the same thing.
Ironically, my experience is that for everyone who, like yourself, publicly accuses me of this, that, or the other, I consistently get about ten people telling me privately that I'm completely correct, and then some.
Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON
I think its terrific that someone who in one sentence of his post is railing against those hiding behind a veil of secrecy but in the next is telling us about his secret friends who support his views. Good thing we are not irony challenged.
I read your comments on all these issues and others and I think that you are exactly the problem with agriculture when something new comes it automatically bad and no matter what system is in place its bad as well in my opinion your way of thinking is old school. I'm a 30 year old crop farmer who started with nothing but a 100 acres of land now I'm farming around 1500ac of beans,wheat and corn I like when new industries like ethanol comes along and why not let it raise food prices everything else keeps going up i.e fuel,houses,automobiles just to name a few. I don't imagine corn prices are to popular with beef and hog farmers but if they could they would raise prices to. I hope the ethanol demand and food demand increase we as farmers can rise to occasion I know I'm for the challenge to feed and fuel the world. But I guess those that can, do and those that cant criticize.
I've been to the Farm Debt Review Board with people, not much older than you, who, when times were good, had the same attitude you do about their own superior management ability - yet when things went bad, it was always somebody else's fault.
And, funny thing too, when I was 30 in 1980, a whole lot of farmers my age said exactly the same thing you're saying about both themselves, and the generation older than them - yet almost all of the younger farmers with this attitude ended up losing their farms.
If I appear to be overly-critical, I have abundant good reason in that for over thirty years, I've been dealing with the human carnage caused by greed, ego, and short-sightedness in the farm community, and if I can prevent even one more person from ending up a blubbering wreck when, not if, things go bad, it's been worth it.
Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON
Businesses fail, excessive expansion is the cause of many of those failures. It's been that way as long as there have been businesses and will be that way long after you and I are laid to rest.
In my experience, by and large those who are bookkeepers are seldom especially entrepreneurial. Those with a knack for one seem to often not have a knack for the other. If you fixate on the risk its often hard to see the opportunity. Without risk there is seldom reward.
I have no more idea than you do whether the young fellow now farming 1500 acres is doing so in a sustainable way, while you see your role as keeping people from making business mistakes by reaching too far one might also ask how many you'll keep from not reaching at all.
Interesting Kenny says We need the A- base funding increased so we can 'attract' those researchers and keep them working on our issues.
Researchers baited by funding what a novel idea. What about "producers and production" baited by profit margins? or our youth attracted by a comparable living?
Comment modified by editors
"Kenney says he’s optimistic, however, and expects the council will see the error in this decision. “We’ll come at it together and we’ll approach the federal government on this issue, stronger than ever with the 100,000 members we represent with this coalition."
Kenny is a long way off the mark with only 40 at his local meeting today. Only 5 from the host county and 1 from the neighbor county. So where is all the enthusiasm for the 99960 other marchers with loud voices?
You mean only 40 farmers showed at the local grain growers meeting. Now there is a story BF should tackle, you think ?. There must have been a protesting army of tails raised skunks keepig the farmers away
"Kenney says he’s optimistic, however, and expects the council will see the error in this decision. “We’ll come at it together and we’ll approach the federal government on this issue, stronger than ever with the 100,000 members we represent with this coalition."
Kenny is a long way off the mark with only 40 at his local meeting today. Only 5 from the host county and 1 from the neighbor county. So where is all the enthusiasm for the 99960 other marchers with loud voices of political pursuation?
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