Why should we worry? Health Canada looks after that! Our consumers depend on that. But, there are many who lobby our different government departments to relax many guardrails that keep our food safe, secure, and full of goodness. For thousands of years, countries have used secure access to food as a weapon. Rulers of some countries have controlled huge grain storages to not only ensure that their own people will always have food, but weaken their enemy. Even in the B.C. period, the Romans and others raided and took over countries by force to control grain supplies. The potato famine was blamed for many of our Irish ancestors leaving Ireland and seeking new land in Canada. But there was no famine for the king of England who controlled all the land in the British monarchy. Even if there was a bad crop in Ireland, the king’s army collected all that the king and his court needed, even if it left the farmers who grew it starving.
For many years, the U.S. has kept all food (grain, beef, pork, chicken, milk, vegetables, etc.) available for less than the cost to produce it. It tried to control the world by exporting food to other countries until the other countries’ farmers quit producing, which left that country dependent upon food imports from the U.S.
Many of Canada’s vegetable growers quit because they couldn’t compete with cheap produce coming from California or chicken from those enormous chicken ranches in the eastern U.S. When U.S. farmers couldn’t survive, they expanded and started using underpaid, often undocumented foreign labour. The U.S. also paid their farmers “loss of profit” money to keep the most efficient farms going. This system ensures that their consumers pay part of the food bill at the checkout and the rest with increased taxes.
Food safety is taken for granted when a consumer goes to the grocery store. Canada has used dairy inspectors to visit dairy farms unexpectedly for many years before I was born. That inspection has evolved and now all dairy farms are required to use the Canadian Quality Milk program. Dairy farmers are required to attend a two-day course explaining how to keep records on all infections, treatments, keep all drugs in a secure place away from where the milk might get exposed. Cattle are checked for body condition so they are not too fat or too thin, the barn is checked for cleanliness, air quality, floor traction and cleanliness, feed quality and quantity, water quality with a yearly water test, constant monitoring of milk temperature, temperature of wash water used for all milking equipment, condition of all milking equipment, and more. The manual is three inches thick. All animal facilities are inspected regularly for adhering to rules and regulations concerning animals, and all environmental concerns, and must even have a plan to address any manure spill.
Have you noticed that most vegetable recalls are on produce from the U.S.? It is often because of E. coli contamination from irrigation of fields growing crops using liquid animal waste. In terms of beef recalls, many have been tracked back to E.coli contamination at a huge abattoir. Poultry contamination is usually caused by salmonella bacteria. The third scary infection is clostridium, mostly noticed in hospitals called “C-difficile”. It is interesting to note that the most used herbicide in the world is also registered as a bactericide which kills most beneficial bacteria, like the ones that make up the biome in your digestive tract, help digest food, and repair lesions in your digestive system, but it does not kill E-coli, salmonella, or clostridiums. When most weeds are killed, crops don’t have to compete for nutrients. When some bacteria are killed, other more harmful bacteria increase in number.
If a food has nutrient density it means that you will not starve to death on a full stomach. Dairy nutritionists have always been very aware of nutrient density of the feeds that make up that ration of animals. An animal’s digestive system is like a big barrel. When it’s full, it’s full and the animal cannot eat any more until some is digested and un-digested food is expelled. An Olympic athlete can’t win the gold medal by eating pop-corn and drinking diet cola. A high producing cow will not produce to her potential by eating oats and “orange hay”, cut after July 12. Any dairy farmer can explain to you how important nutrient density is. He gets paid for the ingredients in the milk – fat, protein, and other solids like lactose and minerals. The dairy man pays all the transportation costs, advertising, and board fees that look after directing trucking, getting the milk to whatever dairy pays the most (milk for drinking pays more than milk turned into powdered skim milk) based on volume shipped. The farmer gets paid zero for the watery part. Same for a beef farmer. Transportation is paid on the total weight of the steer, but an animal that has a high cutting percentage will get a higher per cent of meat to the counter than an “old boner” (like an old cattle drover used to say). Unfortunately, grain is sold by the tonne and not by nutrient density. As long as I can remember, all grain breeding has been looking for the highest grain yield per acre. Most other foods are also sold by weight, not by nutrient density. Cheapest does not always mean the most efficient. Tell your political representative what you want although it may not be what processors, retailers, and the pharmaceutical company thinks is best for them.
Chris Judd is a farmer in Clarendon on land that has been in his family for generations.
