'Aggregate trumps a lot of things'

Friday, May 22, 2009

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

 On Wednesday, Dufferin-Caledon MPP Sylvia Jones told representatives of the North Dufferin Agricultural and Community Task Force what they didn’t want to hear; aggregate extraction is more important than agriculture.

Jones “seemed very attentive,” says Dufferin County farmer Dale Rutledge, but ultimately told the group “aggregate trumps a lot of things.”

Unsuccessful so far in fostering political interest in pursuing a specialty crops designation to protect the farming area north of Shelburne from quarry development, the community task force plans to meet with officials from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs in the next few weeks.

Rutledge and the group plan to soldier on. Ensuring agricultural land remains as that is a “slow, frustrating process,” says the farmer.

The 11-member group fears that 6,000-7,000 acres in the area, recently acquired by The Highland Companies, will be expanded and turned into a giant quarry, eliminating good agricultural land and ruining the area’s water quality.

Ron Miller, Mulmur Township’s planner, says the designation is restrictive. If introduced it could prevent certain types of agricultural production, such as greenhouse growing. The designation does not prevent aggregate extraction, he adds. 

Melancthon council has deferred a decision to pursue the designation until it can review a recent planning report. The report says the proposal “does not provide sufficient technical justification,” for the designation and pursuing it might be hampered by a lack of evaluation criteria from the province.

Donna Mundie, a resources land use policy specialist with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, says a municipality can go ahead without evaluation criteria, which is currently being developed. She adds that that the specialty crops designation would prevent urban development but not aggregate extraction. Agriculture and aggregate extraction are considered compatible because land can be rehabilitated after aggregate use and returned to agriculture.

The Provincial Policy Statement does require that the land be rehabilitated once the aggregates are removed but recognizes there are times this can’t be done. “In some instances there’s going to be such a big hole, you’ll leave water,” she says.

Mundie says the Policy does not limit the size of a quarry.

Daniher says Highland would return quarried land back to agriculture. He also says safeguards limit the size of an open extraction area. “Certainly any project these days regardless, who initiates it, cannot be along the scale as alleged by our critics.”

Currently, Ontario has three specialty crops areas: Niagara’s fruit and wine region, the Holland Marsh in York Region and apple orchards in Grey and Simcoe Counties. According to the Provincial Policy Statement, the designation takes into account soils, climatic conditions, the farmers skilled in its production and the related processing infrastructure.

In its designation proposal, the community task force argues that the area north of Shelburne is unique in Ontario because of its soils and climate. BF