Now what? Our closest, most-trusted neighbour, who Canada has depended on for everything that neighbours have trusted each other with since the War of 1812, has suddenly been changed by a new leader to a very untrustworthy, unpredictable used-to-be friend. A trade war seems to be only a time-consuming distraction from what a president and a very untrustworthy partner of his really want to do with the world. Democracy, as we have known it since before WWI, is under attack. The true leaders of our free world have the hugest decisions of their lives to make, and must make them quickly. Most people have seen this coming since the attack on capitol hill more than four years ago.
The last huge trade decision wasn’t really as much about trade as it was about feeding our troops and civilians in countries under attack during WWII. Our farmers and their families stepped up to the task, and even put the clock ahead an hour so they could work an extra hour or two every day to produce more of everything that could be grown or raised on our free land to provide for those whose lands had been under attack and rendered unfit to even live on let alone farm. After WWII, the world, led by Europe, swore that they would never starve again and began building up food reserves to get them through tough times.
When farmers produced more than their country needed, the country bought up unneeded surplus food and either gave it away to poorer countries or, when the surplus got too large, dropped some in the ocean. I am only old enough to remember when a surplus of eggs, butter, and powdered milk was dumped in the ocean and an opposition MP tried to embarrass our minister of agriculture for this miscalculation. The government of Canada called in some of the best farmers in Canada to work with the agriculture department to come up with a solution. Those farmers knew that, when working with animals, production cannot be turned on and off like a light switch.
From the time that farmers grow fertilized hatching eggs to produce a chick, and grow that chick into an egg-producing hen, it takes about a year. Raising calves to become milk producers has an even longer lead-time, considering that to breed a cow and get her in calf (not all catch on the first breeding, and gestation for a cow is similar to a human’s), and then breed that new heifer when she is about 16 months old, wait another 9 months for her to calve, which is when that newly-calved heifer begins to produce milk (peek production 100 days after calving), and only half the calves are female (also like humans). I once reminded the employees of the milk federation that once you slaughter a cow, there is no more milk until a new heifer calves years later.
That’s why that group of farm leaders and Agriculture Canada officials came up with the supply management system of marketing milk, eggs, and chicken, a system based on three pillars:
- A steady daily supply for a steady price for produce produced within a farm’s quota.
- A cost of production (COP) system that calculates the average cost to produce a pound of milk, enabling the most efficient farmers who could produce milk for less than the average cost would make a profit, while those less efficient would either learn how to become more efficient or find a different way to farm. The COP takes into account every expense on a dairy farm: rent, interest, fertilizer, feed, repairs to fences, machinery, buildings, taxes, cost of fuel, everything. Everybody that has anything to do with milk – farmers, bottlers, processors, retailers, and consumers associations – have to agree to any changes in costs or savings, before any change is made to the price of milk at the farm, at the processor, or at the store.
- The government must protect the farmers from other countries dumping their surplus dairy products into the Canadian market at a price below the Canadian COP. The latest American Farm Bill to support agriculture is about U.S. $1.2 trillion, which the US claims is not a subsidy!
In Canada, because quotas are issued on a daily basis, farmers agree to produce their quota on a daily basis too. Milk plants also have an allotment of milk each day, so a gigantic dairy does not squeeze out a smaller competitor. The provincial milk boards manage all milk shipments guaranteeing payment to producers and a steady supply to milk plants. With an open market system of marketing milk like in the U.S., if a processor quits or goes bankrupt, the farmer who shipped there is suddenly wondering if he will get paid for last month’s milk and is urgently looking for a milk plant to buy his milk.
In Canada, both the milk plants and the government maintain a small refrigerated bank of butter to assure that in peek consumption times like Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc., there will be no shortage of dairy supplies for Canadians. In Canada, all milk producers adhere to the “Canadian Quality Milk” program that farmers have to monitor all milk temperatures electronically, no antibiotics are ever allowed in the milk, all health events with cattle, including calving and cattle movement to different locations, must be recorded. All antibiotics must be recorded and approved by a veterinarian. Every animal must be tagged and tracked from birth until it leaves the farm for health reasons like an epidemic, or other discovery of a health problem either at an abattoir or in a store.
Health regulations in other countries like the U.S. are not the same. Other farm produce like corn, soy, beef, etc., are sold on the open market and are very dependent upon the world market (if no trade tariffs are in place). Great prices mean great profits, but trade embargos and low prices mean that farmers are at the mercy of their governments. Huge farms in the U.S. and the recent bird flu have left consumers paying exorbitant prices for eggs and created uncertainty around chicken prices. Trade embargos like China did to U.S. grain left U.S. farmers wondering where or how much grain would be sold to whom and for how much.
Food security has suddenly become a huge concern to consumers worldwide. Look for that Made-in-Canada symbol. Your Canadian farmers are doing their best.
Chris Judd is a farmer in
Clarendon on land that has been
in his family for generations.
