ACTUALITÉ / NEWS
GPR Liberals help grow new party policy on family farms
debate, and consideration as part of the party’s future policy guide. The party’s new policy on family farms is the result of revisions to the original GPR proposal to accommodate concerns from other regions. The original proposal dealt with concerns about farm land ownership. The final policy agreed on during the national convention moved the focus towards developing a sustainable food supply system for Canada and sustainable income for farmers. “Be it resolved that a Liberal government create a partnership between Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture to develop a national food strategy for Canada that will address food supply, sustainable farm income for farmers, agricultural employment, environmental sustainability, and a secure food supply for Canadians.” Both the original GPR proposal and the final version accepted during the national convention note that costs to keep up with technological improvements, market changes, and regular maintenance, and inflation have created a financial debt situation that is driving many long-time farmers to sell out and preventing young farmers from entering the field. Lemieux unimpressed Pierre Lemieux is less than impressed with the federal Liberal party’s new policy on agriculture. The Conservative MP for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell thinks the policy
G REGG C HAMBERLAIN gregg.chamberlain@eap.on.ca
OTTAWA | Ontario’s family farm tradition received some special attention during the Liberal’s national policy convention thanks to the efforts of the Glengarry-Prescott-Russell riding association. “The main focus was to protect small family farms,” said Connor Quinn, GPR Liberal riding association president, during a phone interview. Part of that focus was to prevent Ontario’s traditional family farm culture from becoming swallowed up in the agri-business maw of international and multi-national corporations. The recent national policy convention held in Ottawa this spring saw the GPR proposal diluted a bit but Quinn expressed satisfaction with the overall result. The policy review submission process leading up to the national convention lasted almost a year and began prior to last year’s spring federal election. Each riding association submitted their policy proposals to a regional review committee which then created a final list of 10 priority items from the region. That list went to the provincial review committee, which created a top 10 list of policy issues out of all the regional lists it received and reviewed. Each provincial association then presented its priority list during the national convention for review,
Part of the focus of a new Liberal policy is to prevent Ontario’s traditional family farm culture from becoming swallowed up in the agri-business maw of international and multi-nationalcorporations. photo archives
proves that the Liberals are out of touch with the concerns of farmers. “The Liberals don’t have a good understanding of agriculture,” said Lemieux during a phone interview. “When you look at our riding (Glengarry-Prescott-Russell) there are lots of medium-sized and large (family) farms and they are good farms. They (Liberals) don’t understand rural ridings. Conservatives hold rural ridings, because Conservatives understand farmers.” The MP questioned whether the Liberals’ policy proposal would not hamper efforts of farm families in the riding
and elsewhere from improving their economic situation through expansion of their holdings. He noted that the issue of “farm debt” is a real one but that when a farm is managed well and allowed to expand and develop, the farm assets increase in value and a farmer is a position to further improve assets by upgrading equipment and/or expanding holdings more to make room for other crops with potential market value.“The farmer knows best how to manage his resources and assets,” Lemieux said, “and I don’t think they should have to be constrained.”
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