Reply to Family Farm Too Costly for Taxpayers

[Oscar]

August 9, 2006
To the Editor,
Montreal Gazette.

This is in response to your recent editorial under the heading "Family farm too costly for taxpayers"

There is another side to your story of how Canada's taxpayers are subsidizing small farm operators. That other side,--if you had taken the time to inquire,--is that a very high percentage of farm operators, both large and small, would tell you what really is happening is that they, the primary producers, are subsidizing the cost of the food that consumers are buying.

Of course you are probably right when you state that Canada has just about the best and cheapest food in the world.

However, it is a fact that the price that farmers receive when they deliver their product to the market is shamefully small, and this is not reflected in the price consumers pay when they fill their grocery baskets at the super market.
Allow me to give you some figures from Canada's Department of griculture. From 1981 to 2003, retail prices for beef increased by $5.67 per kilogram. [kg] The farmer's share of that kg of beef was a pittance of $0.14. The price that the producer received for pork, during that same period, decreased by $0.15 per kg, but the price at the retail level increased by $3.15 per kg. All of this took place during a period when Canadians witnessed an increasing number of large scale production operations. Thousands of animals being crammed into feed lots, and pork being produced in enclosed intensive factory-style hog establishments, which we are told are the epitome of large scale production and efficiency.

The price of a box of cornflakes had doubled to $1.91 between 1981 and 2003. But the producer of the corn in that box received only a measly three cents of that increase. One bushel [60 pounds] of wheat is the basis for about 60 loaves of bread. The producer who planted and harvested that wheat over a period about four months will receive about 10 cents from each loaf of bread, for which the consumer will pay about $2.00. If the producer gave that wheat to the processor for free, it is doubtful if the price of that loaf of bread would decrease.

You see supply management as the cause of the high price of food. But even in milk, which operates under that system, the return to the producer increased 44%, while the cost to the consumer increased by 10%.

You compared small farm operations to what a back yard auto parts operation would be like. Well, auto parts, farm machinery and farm input costs generally have risen dramatically in the last two decades. This, despite the fact that now there are fewer but larger scale operations than we ever had in the past. From 1992 to 2003, the cost of a variety of farm machinery has increased between 49% to 74%,fertilizers have increased 67%, pesticides 60%, farm labour 29 %, and seed 50 %. Your readers can well understand what the rapidly increasing cost of farm fuels is doing to the bottom line of all farm operations.

Despite this disastrous situation, in an effort to make ends meet, farm operators have substantially increased the production of food. Agricultural exports have risen at a phenomenal rate, while at the same time farm operators including some relatively large scale operations are seeing a zero or negative figure on their bottom line.

Rural depopulation is a global crisis. Millions of people have no access to land on which to grow food for themselves. When the completed total cycle of the production of food is taken over by large scale corporate production units, than we, the farmers and consumers, will finally understand that Canada will no longer have the best and cheapest food in the world.

Thank you Editor for publishing this letter.

Yours sincerely,

Leo Kurtenbach,
Box 268, Cudworth, Sask., SOK 1BO
Phone #306 256-3638
leokurt@sasktel.