These are nerve-racking times for many, but this is not new!
About 40 years ago, the prime minister of Canada and the president of the United States decided that there should be a free trade agreement between the two countries. When we look back, it was mostly the idea of their rich friends.
Years before that, Bud Drury, a Liberal MP from Westmount and a cabinet minister in Pearson’s government, was the chair of a committee given the job to draw up and table the Auto Pact agreement between Canada and the United States. This agreement, eventually signed by both countries, would guarantee that all cars manufactured in both countries must contain a large percentage of US and/or Canadian parts. This turned out to be a real savior of the auto parts industry in both countries. The new free trade agreement (FTA) replaced the Auto Pact, and now you don’t have to be told what that did to our car and truck manufacturing business in both the US and Canada. A few big traders got richer, while thousands of workers in that “used-to-be” auto-truck industry watched their jobs disappear from both the US and Canada.
Farmers were also used as a ploy during the FTA talks. We were told that dairy farmers had to give up some of their market quota in order for the US to accept Canadian grain. That’s what politicians told us, or maybe they didn’t even know that without hard red Canadian wheat, pasta and even high-quality bread couldn’t be made. The US had developed a popular higher-yielding wheat that was softer and much lower quality. The US couldn’t make pasta or good bread without that Canadian “hard red”! Italy refuses to use any US wheat and only uses their own hard red wheat for pasta and bread.
The result of the recent US election has left the world scratching their heads because of the threat of huge tariffs placed on imports to the USA. Canada is threatened with 25 per cent tariffs on everything going to the US. This includes oil that supplies over half of the US needs. The US has no aluminum – the last time that they didn’t get Canadian aluminum, they ran out of aluminum to make beer cans. Now Ford makes their most popular vehicle in North America with military grade aluminum. The US also slapped a much larger tariff on all Chinese products coming into the US. China is the largest buyer of US grain (soy and corn), mostly used for animal feed. Russia, India, New Zealand and South America can supply all the non-GMO grains they need for human consumption, and grain prices are low all over the world.
China also just released a new electric car battery that is half as heavy, has over twice the power and range, charges in half the time, lasts many times longer, and doesn’t burn. I don’t think that Donnie did much research on these items before announcing the tariffs. The US president also wants to take over Greenland, Panama, and Canada. I doubt he consulted the rest of the world powers before making that announcement either.
Now Canadians will be faced with some new decisions because the Canadian PM resigned and prorogued parliament, leaving several important bills on the table that may be debated after parliament reconvenes. These include: Bill C-234 which would exempt all farmers from the carbon tax (outside Quebec and BC which have a different systems to reduce carbon); Bill C-293 which would alleviate the possibility of a food pandemic by regulating the industrial production of plant-based and lab-fabricated meat replacements; Bill C-359 on pesticide residue in feeds for both humans and animals (in seed and in sprays); Bill C-275 on Biosecurity, sanctioning everyone who enters without authorization into an area where sick animals are or toxic chemicals; Bill C-287 on the transport, fabrication, possession, handling, storage, importing, distribution, and use of glyphosate; and the reintroduction of a bill to protect supply management from trade negotiations.
Canada is the ONLY country who has a supply management system of marketing milk, eggs and poultry. Every country that gave up supply management noticed a slight decrease in consumer price, but within a few months, consumer price resumed or increased above what prices had been before supply management was removed. The producers received less, the consumers paid as much or more and the huge food markets made much higher profits. Supply management is the only marketing system where producers, manufacturers, retailers, and consumer associations can closely inspect all costs used in calculating cost of production (COP) formula before any increase or decrease in the price that the producer will receive. This spring, the price that the farmer will receive for milk will decrease because some input costs have decreased. If the store price for milk does not decrease, don’t blame the farmer.
All countries that eliminated the supply management system of marketing had to use tax dollars to subsidize their dairy farmers to reduce farm bankruptcies, mental health problems and suicides!
Meanwhile, the “axe the tax” one-liner that the opposition leader used has become redundant. I wonder where the money will come from to correct climate change now? Donnie says it’s a hoax, but the rest of the world doesn’t agree.
Chris Judd is a farmer in Clarendon on land that has been in his family for generations.
