Regulation changes proposed for Grain Farmers

Thursday, October 17, 2013

by SUSAN MANN

Proposed minor regulation changes to Grain Farmers of Ontario will ensure the organization continues to run smoothly, says chair Henry Van Ankum.

The changes are posted on the government Regulatory Registry and people can comment on them until Nov. 18. A Farm Products Marketing Act regulation sparked the review. The regulation requires the review when an organization reaches its third year anniversary. Grain Farmers was created on Jan. 1, 2010. It’s an amalgamation of the previously separate, corn, wheat and soybean boards.

Grain Farmers proposed a number of changes that were reviewed by the Ontario Farm Products Marketing Commission, and the commission agreed to support the amendments, it says on the registry. The changes are to be in place for Jan. 1, 2014, Van Ankum says.

Commission chair Geri Kamenz says by email legislation isn’t required to implement the changes as the proposals are within the commission’s scope of authority.

One proposal calls for the elimination of the regulation that puts a cap on the amount of financial reserves Grain Farmers can hold. The commission agreed to remove the cap from the regulations but is requiring Grain Farmers to develop a policy “consistent with commission guidelines on operating reserves,” the registry says.

“There was a commitment from Farm Products to review the initial regulations that formed GFO (Grain Farmers of Ontario) to see if those initial regulations had hit the mark or some adjustments were needed,” Van Ankum says.

Around the time Grain Farmers was formed, farm leaders within the organization didn’t agree with putting a cap on the amount of financial reserves for the organization. But “that was the way the regulations were written at that time,” he says. The cap was one year’s annual operating expenses.

Grain Farmers was the only board in Ontario with a regulated cap on reserves, Van Ankum notes. “We felt that wasn’t a good model for fiscal responsibility.”

Other proposed changes include:

• District committee delegates would begin the day of their election instead of the day following it.
• Farmers who haven’t paid their license fees to Grain Farmers on grain sold two years before the election of district committee delegates will no longer be eligible to be elected as delegates, (which therefore means they also can’t be elected or appointed to the board).
• GFO board members would be elected to a two-year term instead of a one-year term. The elections would be staggered so there would be new directors every year but there would also be continuity because the entire board isn’t made up of new members.
• The business address of a farmer registered with Grain Farmers would be used to determine the producer’s district for committee elections and appointments to the Grain Farmers board.
• There would be amendments to clarify the role of district grain committees.
• Amendments would remove the transitional provisions of the first Grain Farmers board.

Van Ankum says in the three years since Grain Farmers was formed things have gone very well. “With great leadership from staff and around the board table, I think we’ve made a really good transition from three boards into one with a focus on working hard on behalf of the members.” BF