2019 CAFLP Annual Conference Keynote Recap: “From Level of Risk to Volume of Production: Negotiating Food in the Middle”

What does the future of agriculture look like? Is it based around larger-scale farms manned by automated drones, tractors, and weeders or is it based around fostering deeper personal connections with and stewardship of the land in line with agroecological principles? How will that future of food affect the processors who link our farmers with our eaters?

Friday night’s keynote gathered three actors engaged in food production and processing to discuss the possible answers to these questions. The panelists featured: Keith Currie from the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, Stuart Oke from the National Farmers Union, and Kathleen Sullivan from Food & Beverage Canada.

Keith

“The problem between farmers and consumers is that my generation of farmers didn’t have this conversation at all and I am sorry for that.”

Speaking from the perspective of the large agricultural community in Ontario, Keith suggested that the “problems” people relate to agriculture may not be much of a problem at all. Though people often cite the average age of farmers (56 years old in Canada) as a worrisome metric, he shared that the average age of farmers has been around 56 years old since he started farming 60 years ago. This may be due to the multigenerational structure of many farm families. Plus, “youth are finding farming sexy again” thanks to new technological innovations. The move to automated tractors and weeders, plus unmanned drones to do spot control on pests and weeds, leaves him hopeful for the future of farming (as long as they can get past the lack of internet connectivity in much of rural Canada). Overall, Keith sees great opportunity in the future of agriculture.

Stuart

“Farms are being systematically destroyed by the squeeze of costly agricultural chemical inputs and by regulations that are tailored to larger farms.” 

Stuart, a first-generation farmer, runs an organic farm in Quebec with his partner where they focus on implementing sustainable agricultural practices following principles of agroecology and food sovereignty. Unlike Keith, he is deeply concerned by barriers facing farmers, especially young farmers seeking to get into agriculture. With an 18-year horizon line on turnover of farms, over 70% of surveyed farmers say they have no succession plan in place and the costs of agricultural land keep aspiring young farmers from accessing available land. But land access isn’t even the biggest problem. In the last 30 years, corporations supplying agricultural inputs (including chemicals and equipment) have captured 97% of farm revenues, leaving only 3% left over for farmers. The squeeze of high input costs and low profit margins has pushed a third of farm families out of farming in the last generation, while farmers under 35 have left agriculture at two times the rate since 1991. However, the potential of agroecology to flip the current extractivist model leaves him hopeful that we can create a sustainable, healthy and equitable system for farmers and eaters.

Kathleen

“I absolutely care who is at the table.”

Kathleen reiterated this theme in both her talk on the state of food processing in Canada and in discussion about the need to increase the diversity of voices at decision-making tables. She was absolutely the voice of “negotiating food in the middle” last night, providing the perspective of food manufacturers who are the middle of the chain between farmers and eaters. There is a need to focus on creating sustainable health in this industry. Food and beverage manufacturing is the number one manufacturing sector in Canada—larger than both the auto and aerospace industry. Yet, of Food & Beverage Canada’s large membership, 95% of member companies are considered “small” of “mid-sized.” Smaller companies have much lower individual capacities to absorb and sort through and implement new regulatory changes. There is a need to look at laws and regulations through the lens of these companies and take that burden into account. More than anything, Kathleen says that “we must talk to each other.” While she graduated law school 25 years ago, 50% of her law class was women, but only 13% are in the profession today and “as an industry, we must own solving this problem.”

Closing Comments

In writing this post, I chose to capture the positions each of our speakers held as well as the perspectives they provided on the future directions of food and agriculture. The tones of the speakers diverged markedly, but each at some point referenced a history of not engaging in these conversations outside of their communities. Keith pointed to a lack of dialogue between farmers and eaters as a driver in the prevalence of misconceptions about large-scale farming practices today. Stuart talked about the need to dialogue with regulators to ensure that new regulations don’t unintentionally destroy the ability of small- and medium-sized farms to access the market. Kathleen talked about the need for food manufacturing companies to join this conversation, and for trade associations to come forward with cohesive ideas and approaches that can proactively contribute to regulatory decisions.

Personally, I have attended sessions on “the future of agriculture” for years where someone said that we need to bring the different players in the food system into the same room. Yet, this is the first time in my memory when a panel convened a large-scale farmer, an agroecologist, and food processing representative into the same room to compare their visions for the future. As Kathleen said, “we must talk to each other” and this panel last night was an excellent start to the conversation.