P.E.I. farmers don’t want to be “fenced in” when it comes to land limitations and plan to seek legislative changes allowing for as much as a 50 per cent increase in acreage ownership for big corporate farms.
Like Roy Rogers singing “Don’t Fence Me In” on his trusty horse Trigger, Island farmers want to shoot some holes in 30-year-old provincial legislation they say impedes growth in the agricultural sector.
It was a resolution that came from the floor at the annual meeting of the P.E.I. Federation of Agriculture and calls for individual ownership of arable land to increase from 1,000 to 1,500 acres and corporations to up size their combos from 3000 to 4500 acres.
“A lot has changed in 30 years (since original legislation was enacted) and farmers who support this resolution say it would increase their competitiveness and reduce the red tape,’’ says Bertha Campbell, chair of the federation. “And from an environmental point of view, expanded land limits would have the positive impact of not forcing farmers to clear some ‘less suitable’ land that they now own.”
The resolution, approved by the federation, calls for changes to the Lands Protection Act, a venerable piece of legislation enacted in 1980 to help control the purchase of Island farmland sought by such operations as Cavendish Farms in an effort to prevent corporations from acquiring too much property in the million acre farm.
“The Federation of Agriculture realizes that land ownership is a sensitive issue,” said Campbell. “But not addressing it, is not a solution.”
P.E.I. is the only region in Canada to limit the amount of land that can be controlled by any one person or corporation.
Thirty years ago, there was almost 1,000 dairy farms in P.E.I., but that number has dwindled to less than 200 operations providing the same amount of milk production. In the potato world, she said, 825 farms in 1982 with an average size of 81 acres have become 275 potato operations with an average size of 310 acres.
“There has been a lot of consolidation of smaller farms into somewhat larger farms,’’ she said. “This is neither good nor bad; it is simply a reality of farming in the 21st century.”
The Queens County-based farmer said consolidation in agriculture has happened mainly due to decreasing margins which means farmers require a larger land base in order to sustainably operate.
“Farmers want to farm within the laws of the provinces, and be in compliance at all times, but sometimes the restrictions imposed by the current Lands Protection Act make it difficult. There is a very real need to ensure that the main economic driver in the province (agriculture) remains competitive, and that outdated legislation does not impede growth.”
i suppose you would prefer all farms on PEI to disappear so you could get all your food from the China, Brazil or Argentina where all farming is controlled by multinationals. The level of ignorance you show is appalling!