#4 Renewal

[parsley]

Make your comments!

[TOM4CWB]

Charlie,

This is probably the hardest subject to deal with, when everyone says what we are doing is not needed, and someone else in some far off land can do what my farm does for half the cost.

Soooo, are we to raise, ducks, Canada geese and buffalo in 20 years?

What exactly are farmers supposed to do, what is the "right thing to do"?

bin Laden was supposed to teach us something, or did we learn anything at all from all this grief?

How many billions, into the trillions will we spend defending our corner on civilisation, and to prove what?

That we, (Canadian society) doesn't even really care about anything but money, and food producers are not worthy of even being considered honourable members of society?

[charliep]

You describe the problems. What are the solutions? My thoughts are this has to occur at the individual manager level - the farm manager identifies their needs and there are tools (private and government) to assist them.

Initially, the renewal chapter was simply about providing farm families who weren't making it in their business a honorable way out and some transition assistance. Since then it has changed to provide managers the tools to improve their bottom line (financial, marketing, production, etc.). Assisting new entrants is also a part of this chapter.

[charliep]

Renewal has to come from each individual farmer. The renewal information is all available from the agricultural industry. Look around you, pick a neighbour who appears to be doing well at his choosen production. Gain information from him plus from your agricultural imput dealer or your product handler. The government should be your last place for information gathering.

Agriculture prospers from individual innovational renewal from within the agriculture industry not from government interference. Governement makes you dependent instead of creating for yourself. If you want a steady pay cheque get a job. Maybe you need to be supervised to be successful in live.

[cowman]

So what happened to the honourable way out? It seems to me the Maritime fishermen got a fairly decent package to quit. If you got rid of just one third of the farmers it would allow the rest to "maybe" survive. The problem is the Canadian farmer has become too efficient and therefore isn't needed. It almost seems the government is too cheap to pay for an honourable way out. Why should they pay? Wait a few years and age and bankruptcy will take care of the problem! Is that the dishonourable way out?