Study seeks answers on agriculture workers

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The government didn't even touch any of the Ag streams of the TFWP so I don't see why anyone would be worrying. Furthermore there is a lot that could be done, but right now isn't, to attract more Canadians to these jobs. I for one left not because the work was "too hard" (if anything it was too easy!) or "too dirty" (who cares?) or too "seasonal" (it wasn't). I left because it was a low-paying dead-end job with absolutely no opportunity for advancement (family run), no career development or training provided, and no chance to learn anything or have more responsibility as time went on. I would have been better off working at McDonald's, same pay but at least they give you benefits. Truly they wanted a donkey, nothing more. Oh and as a female I was hardly made welcome on an all-male crew. As long as farms keep treating their employees this way they continue to have problems with labour shortages.

Farm jobs from un. pay less than many jobs not enough to raise a family or buy a 100 acres. less than $20.00 per hour

The farmers need to pay wage surcharge above 10,000 foreign worker hours per year of $5.00 per hour to subidize canadain farm workers who were looking for work

This should happened when the auto trade slowed down in 2008

I can't believe what I am reading . And people wonder why we are having the problems are .
Get the lazy people off welfare and make them get out and work and we would not need many TFWS . People complain about imigrants moving here and taking jobs but at least they have a good work ethic .

For a whole lot of reasons, I deal on a regular basis with people on welfare, and it's not right, and it's not fair, to sweepingly-categorize them as lazy.

True, some are lazy in exactly the same way there are lazy farmers, but many have health issues which, although not visible to the man-on-the street, are nonetheless quite-limiting.

For example, a good number suffer from anxiety, depression or even schizophrenia, and for that reason alone, as anyone who has ever had a family member suffer from depression knows all-too-well, means they have such low periods that they'd lose any job they might be lucky enough to have obtained before the depression took its toll.

Forcing people who exist on a fine line of physical and emotional health to work at something which, for whatever reason, is beyond their physical and/or emotional capabilities is not just cruel to them, it places an undue burden on our health care, our social service networks and our legal system.

Sometimes, alas, the best thing we can do for people is to say - "here, take this money and keep out of sight".

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

A thoughtful post until the last sentence.

Comment modified by editor.

Yes but many of these farmers and people on welfare both need to work harder so jobs like trimming turnips are not done by offshore workers in the winter

These jobs all pay less than other fields like being a nurse or a policeman. Many people get off farm jobs in other fields that pay too much better.

Even farmers get jobs off the farm . The problem is that food is too cheap in order to pay better . Raise the price of food and the pay will get better but people will complain about the cost of food but not the cost of hydro , internet , cell phone , booze etc.
The problem also is that farmers will produce food for what they can get for it rather than setting their own price .

Supply management and ethanol both drive up the price of food, thereby making Canada anything but a cheap food country.

In addition, the rapid increase in the price of farmland means that farmers believe the price of food is going to substantially increase in order to pay for these farms.

Or, to look at it in another way, the recent increase in the price of farmland could easily be used to support the claim that the price of food is already too high.

From the political point of view, no politician anywhere, given $15,000 per acre land sales, is going to support any sort, type or kind of increase in farm support programs, nor should they. And, not just that, but our collective mania about farmland is putting us at substantial risk of losing whatever farm support programs we already have, especially AgriInvest.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Should be limited to $1,000.00 per farmer per year and only to farmers with a net assets under 5 million. F,C.C. should be limited to lending $2,000,000

They have both always been expensive but at these prices. Young people can not get into farming without a rich (uncle)

Just curious, at $15 grand per acre plus taking your age into consideration, this would be your gold opportunity to put a sign up at the end of your lane and invest the proceeds of your several hundred acres in stocks as Raube has been suggesting and be an armchair quarterback. Why the hesitation?

I sold half in 2005 and I'm left with a 240-acre roof over my head which I'd kind of like to keep. I'll buy again when things get back to a 10 - 15 P/E multiple, and they will - it's happened twice in my lifetime and I'll see it happen again.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Don't be shy. You could sell more and still have a roof over your head. Couple that windfall with your current nest egg and invest in Raub's stock advice you could be a multi millionaire by the time land ever gets cheap again. By that time interests rates would very likely be sky high as in 19%, so why invest in land when you are currently pension age.

Let me see if I've got this right - somebody who is too shy to sign his/her name is telling sombody does sign their name to not be shy.

What is it about "Physician, heal thyself" and/or "the pot calling the kettle black" when it comes to giving advice/admonitions do members of this site's anonymous and double-standard loving posters not understand?

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Farm land has went from $3,600.00 to $12,000.00 per acre good plan Stephen

Food prices in Canada and the US are always competing for the lowest in the world at 10 to 12 per cent of disposable income.

That is certainly a useless statistic. Do you suppose Chakma from the UWO pays $120,000 per year for food? Or do you suppose someone on border line poverty only pays $1400 per year on food.

Averages are always most relevant around the center of the distribution of the sample.
In this case, this average is extremely relevant and most meaningful between perhaps $50,000 and $150,000 annually that would include the vast majority of most family incomes.

Extremes at either end of the range don't prove or disapprove anything, they only illustrate that they are extreme. Yup, food is a much higher percentage if you earn minimum wage in Toronto  than it is for Conrad Black and apartment rental is a crazy percentage - wow, what an insight.

What this average does show is that Canada's food is cheap relative to incomes - almost exactly the same average food cost as Americans appreciate.

In response to "Can't admit food is cheap - even with our mouths full!!!!!!!" http://betterfarming.com/comment/15961#comment-15961

You say "...Canada's food is cheap relative to incomes - almost exactly the same average food cost as Americans appreciate."

We have now been given the link to these data (see wsm.wsu.edu/researcher/wsmaug11_billions.pdf ) where we can see Canada is 9.1%. I also note that the USA (6.8%), UK (8.9%), Ireland (7.5%), and Singapore (8.1%) all have cheaper food as a % of disposable income than what Canada has; 36% cheaper in the case of USA.

I note that this statistic is a broad generality statistic for all foods and all citizens. When we zero in on LICO (Low Income Cutoff, ie. those living in poverty) or Minimum Wage Earners, and look at Supply Management commodities (ie. dairy, chicken, turkey), I suggest that the situation gets a lot worse than the broad generality that you and others choose as your misguided focus.

Based on Small Flockers analysis of chicken prices, we have said that Canada pays 50% to 300% more for chicken than the USA. When we consider the special gouging for chicken averaged in with normal, non-SM foods, we can easily understand why the price difference averages to Canadians paying 36% more for food than our US neighbours.

This is in spite of Canada having similar or same infrastructure and access via transportation corridors.

Removal of the special interest Supply Management system that screws all other citizens would be the first and biggest impact to giving Canadians more affordable food.

Glenn Black
Small Flock Poultry Farmers of Canada

If Canada has the "cheapest food in the world" as claimed by the above anonymous poster, then why do we need to have 200% tariff barriers to keep out more expensive food coming from elsewhere?

While comparing prices of food to disposable income is always popular with supply management supporters, it is a meaningless comparison which, like every other meaningless and irrelevant half-truth trotted out to support supply management, ignores the actual price of that food in comparison to the prices in other jurisdictions.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

No mention of sm there - that is your whipping boy.
Tariffs were calculated and set in relation to other countries' subsidy levels.
We have tariffs because they have subsidies. Most countries have tariifs. They go down over time. Butter tariff was highest at about 350, now it is 200.
That, for example, is why the US has dairy tariffs of about 90% on dairy imports.
By your usual argument, this means US price levels are roughly twice what they should be.
That, of course, is nonsense.
Food is cheap here, fact, accept it or not.

The original boast was that Canada had the world's cheapest food prices - the obvious (to everyone except people who own quota) fallacy of that argument is that if we had the world's cheapest food prices we wouldn't need tariff barriers in the first place.

Therefore, what, and/or how, including the use of subsidies, other jurisdictions do to help lower food prices, is irrelevant because they obviously have cheaper food which Canada wants to keep out - thereby making it obvious to anyone but supply management supporters that Canada does NOT have the cheapest food in the world

Why is the obvious truth about the direct relation between tariff barriers and high prices for food something that supply management supporters just can't ever accept or handle?

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Food prices in Canada and the US are always competing for the lowest in the world at 10 to 12 per cent of disposable income. Fact.

Our two countries have the cheapest food in the world. Fact.

Simple fact even if some can't accept or handle it.

Percentage of disposable income does not equal cheap. We also have among the highest disposable incomes in the world.

The pedantic, anonymous and probably quota-owning poster who keeps trying to promote the idea that percentages equate to cheap, doesn't get the point, as if supply management supporters ever do.

Spending 10% of a $100,000 income on food in country A equals $10,000
Spending 20% of a $50,000 income on food in country B also equals $10,000

Therefore, if a unit of food costs exactly the same in both countries, for supply management supporters to claim food is "cheaper" in country A than in country B because consumers are spend less as a percentage of their income on food, not only ignores the inter-jursdictional unit pricing of that food, it also sidesteps the fact that the percentage of incomes spent on food would go down in Canada, not up, if supply management disappeared. It's not what the percentage is now with supply management, but how much lower it would be without it.

However, the definitive proof we don't have cheap food is the presence of tariff barriers to keep it out - if we had cheap food, we wouldn't have, or need, tariff barriers.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

So, let's see....
You have just concisely proven that you:
Don't really understand comparisons based on % disposable income.
Don't really understand the reason behind tariffs and how they work.

(1) Comparisons based on a percentage of disposable income measure only the relative affordability of something, rather than examining the price of the item itself. For example dairy and poultry products could cost twice as much in Country I as in Country 2 but could be more "affordable" in Country 1 because disposable incomes are higher - therefore, claiming something is cheap because of its relative affordability is, at best, a half-truth, and at worst, completely-misleading, or in other words, a tactic used by supply management supporters to confuse consumers about what the inter-jurisdictional retail price differences really are.
(2) tariffs are put in place to protect domestic producers at the expense of consumers - that's the reason behind them and that's how they work, period - any other explanation is bogus.

And, as well, unsigned economics term papers, like unsigned comments, deserve and get, zero.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

As was well siad by NDP leader Andrea Horwath when speaking about the sale of Hydro One . People might be able to have better access to cheap beer but they won't be able to afford the hydro to keep it cold .
Any one want to throw the high cost of hydro into the food cost mix ?!!!!

No sense arguing when he can't even see it as a simple average of all food costs .
You would be better spending your time pushing a rope uphill !

Simple averages of food costs mean nothing to the 800-pound gorilla of 200% tariff barriers. It's simply not possible to have cheap food as long as we have 200% tariff barriers keeping it out.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

In reply to "Not A Boast, A Simple Fact" http://betterfarming.com/comment/15959#comment-15959

Let's take chicken as an example.

1. The TRQ tariff is between free to $0.019/kg, depending on the country of origin, but only applies a maximum of 7.5% of the previous year's kg of chicken consumed of in Canada, Tariff #0105.94.91. The 1,577 page CBSA document T2015 available at cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/trade-commerce/tariff-tarif/2015/01-99/01-99-t2015-eng.pdf , defines these tariffs, see page 34. Are we agreed on that?

2. After the TRQ tariff is fully used, chicken imported to Canada faces a 238% import tariff, or $1.25/kg, whichever is greater; under Tariff # 0105.94.92 which is also on page 34. Are we agreed on that?

3. After importing the chicken, it is eventually sold at retail in Canada in some shape or form.

4. One of the three legs of Supply Management is to protect the Canadian growers and processors from the importation of cheap chicken from foreign countries, which would undercut the Canadian growers & processors, causing them to lose market share more and more. Are we agreed on that?

5. The typical mark-up in the USA and Canada is around 40% from processor to retail. That allows the processor, distributor, truckers, and retailers to all get paid when they facilitate the production & distribution of chicken. Are we all agreed on that?

6. All of those basic, simple facts listed above lead us to the conclusion that chicken for sale outside of Canada is far cheaper than inside Canada. That is why foreign chicken can still be imported from USA (64.4%), Brazil (20.91%), Thailand (13.89%), Chile (0.36%), Germany (0.32%), and Israel (0.12%) at deep discount prices, then jacked up by a 238% tariff, and then be sold at a profit inside Canada. These importation data are from
FOREIGN AFFAIRS, TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT CANADA - TRADE CONTROLS BUREAU, available at www.eics-scei.gc.ca/report-rapport/Chicken%20Country%20Summary.htm Are we agreed?

7. If the chicken outside of Canada was more expensive that Canadian chicken as you claim, then that foreign chicken, when imported into Canada, would be at least 399% more expensive than Canadian retail chicken (ie. 2.85*1.4= 3.99). If you or anybody else was trying to sell foreign chicken at 399% higher price than Canadian chicken, who would buy it? Would you buy it? I certainly wouldn't.

8. You claim that Canadian and US food prices are just 10% to 12% of disposable income. Is that for billionaires, or somebody living at the LICO poverty level? What is your unbiased, verifiable source for these so-called "facts"? Please provide the link to that data.

9. I have tried to explain why your so-called "fact" about food as a % of disposable income in Canada & US is misleading and fallacious. You ignored my point and merely re-stated your same bald assertion, with nothing to back it up, and you made no effort to prove my point is invalid. Please explain why you chose to ignore my point?

Anybody who reads my posting and your postings can clearly see the difference between our approach. If you have a valid point, then back it up with evidence that all the world can verify.

If you don't have a valid point, then admit it here & now.

Somehow, I expect you to either:

* Disappear, never to be heard from again (hard to tell since you are anonymous), or

* You will re-state your bald assertion of food costs as a % of disposable income a third time, and again with no source to back it up

Glenn Black
Small Flock Poultry Farmers of Canada

Enjoyed your lengthy, carefully crafted response. Nice effort.

Unfortunately,  all the effort you spent on the research and mental gymnastics to cobble together your first seven points is rendered irrelevant because you have missed the most basic point about chicken imports coming into Canada.

Drum roll please......  Virtually none are subject to ANY tariff. They come in TARIFF-FREE.

The products can come in tariff-free in two main ways.  1. Under global import permits that give the importing broker tariff-free imports of a set tonnage annually or, 2. as a chicken cut, part or mix with other ingredients -specifically made to be excluded from the Canadian tariff lines that would attract paying the tariff. Great business model - import subsidized and/or surplus cheap cuts - pay no tariffs - and mark it up to Canadian prices. For the brokers, it is like printing money.  Easy way to make money compared to hobby farming on Manitoulin, eh? 

Funny thing is, that most of the same chicken cuts would attract tariffs if you turned around and tried to move them back across the border into the US. The Americans have much more comprehensive tariff coverage and are not shy about creating new tariff lines to slam the door on imports.

You are not alone, a lot of seemingly well-educated people on this site don't understand the real purpose and functioning of tariffs. 

Your ridiculous denial about food cost facts does not take much effort to respond to - the data is tracked regularly by the US Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. Easy to find - try GOOGLE. There is a nice publication of the USDA data published by  Washington State University at http://wsm.wsu.edu/researcher/wsmaug11_billions.pdf

In that year, Canadian's spent 9.8 % of disposable income on food. (2009, source - USDA)

Attacks on interpreting averages only reveal a lack of understanding of stats or perhaps the general innumeracy that seems endemic in our society.

So, back at you, since you did not have valid points, admit it here & now.

Luckily, I don't really have any expectations of you.

While the above anonymous poster attempts to be haughty and all-knowing by using words such as "innumeracy" and "endemic", he/she employs grammar weaknesses typically used by those who pretend to be more than they really are - or, in other words, using poor grammar and/or sentence structure to excoriate what they see to be bad arithmetic or, in the vernacular, "the pot calling the kettle black".

For example, while the term "none are" is narrowly-acceptable, many believe term "none is" to be more acceptable. Therefore, people with good literary skills avoid the term completely by writing something like - "Most chicken imports are tariff-free".

In addition, the phrase - "does not take much effort to respond to" is, while a common occurence, still identifies poor literacy skills. A skilled writer would state - "You seem to have a poor understanding of food costs".

Furthermore, the above anonymous poster once again trots out the meaningless claim that in a recent year Canadians spent 9.8% of their disposable income on food, all the while ignoring the truth that this statement could easily say more about our disposable incomes than the cost of the food we eat.

The above anonymous poster also seems to go to great lengths to avoid even more obvious points about chicken imports. For example, while he/she goes to great lengths to claim that most imported chicken comes in tariff-free, he/she sidesteps:

(A) the obvious implication that tariffs effectively keep anything more than that out.
(B) the obvious implication that Canadian chicken farmers are still able to gouge consumers on what does get produced in Canada.

In conclusion, I suggest the above anonymous poster is a "snake-in-the-grass" - somebody well-enough educated to be able to use half-truths, yet not well-enough educated to be able to state things with any degree of sophistication or talent.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Nothing says "hitting a home-run" quite like somebody taking issue with the most-minute and least-relevant details of a post.

And you sunk his rubber dinghy !!
It's about all the sight is worth any more .

Lest the above anonymous poster forget, the offending post was dripping with anonymous scorn, derision, sarcasm and withering dismissiveness to, and about, Mr. Black.

Posts like that demean any site, especially when coming from anonymous entities who, by virtue of the vocabulary they chose to use, should know better, yet obviously don't.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

I suggest I quite-appropriately took issue with the double-standard of:

(1) seeing an anonymous entity pretend to be smart enough to use words like "innumeracy" and "endemic"
(2) seeing the same entity actually be not smart enough to realize that ratios, including ratios dealing with food costs as a percentage of disposable incomes, say as much about the denominator as the numerator.

More to the point, pompous twits who, like the original poster, try to anonymously throw their weight around and try to use big words (and bad grammar) to advance half-truths, deserve to be "slam-dunked", and I was doing nothing more than what so-needed to be done.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

In response to "Be careful what you ask for Glenn........." http://betterfarming.com/comment/15976#comment-15976

Thanks for supplying the link to your data source. University of Washington seems like a valid source , so I accept the source. However good the source, that doesn't necessarily mean that this method of comparison of nations is valid in all cases.

I note that the USA, UK, Ireland, and Singapore all have cheaper food as a % of disposable income than what Canada has; 36% cheaper in the case of USA. So even if we accept your mis-guided measurement, your own statistic shows that Canada could be 36% better than today. I note that this is a broad generatity statistic for all foods and all citizens. When we zero in on LICO (Low Income Cutoff, ie. those living in poverty) or Minimum Wage Earners, and look at Supply Management commodities (ie. dairy, chicken, turkey), I suggest that the situation gets a lot worse than the broad generality you choose as your focus.

If a government policy is OK for 86% of the population, but forces the other 14% into abject mistreatment, poverty, disease, and malnutrition, is that government policy acceptable? For example, the 1850's survey of USA was the first counting of slaves, finding 3.2 million slaves in a total population of 23.2 Million; or 13.8% slavery.

That is a clear example of why your broad, over-reaching, and misleading statistic is dangerous. I suggest we need to look at all segment of society, not just the majority.

I have provided a clear, specific alternative statistic to your misleading alternative (ie. food costs calculated for each decile [10% of population slice] of family income). You seem to have posted three times, but have chosen to remain silent on the pros and cons of my alternative. Why is that? Do you have proof or logic to show that your suggestion is better than mine? If you do, please share it.

I agree with you that there is much "cheating" going on with chicken; all to the disadvantage of most Canadians for the unjust, excessive profits of a small special interest group. One example is "spent chicken" that even has CFC and CFO worried, even though some or most of that "cheating" or gouging is being done by their own members, domestic chicken processors, and their henchmen.

Similar cheating has been going on for chicken that is imported for alleged re-export (ie. see http://canadiansmallflockers.blogspot.ca/2013/03/magical-trucks-of-chick... ), where CFC had their knuckle rapped by FPCC for turning a blind eye to it.

I admit that I am not fully aware of all the cheating in chicken that is going on. Who is? It seems you have specific knowledge in this area. I, and most other readers here and elsewhere, would listen carefully to your greater knowledge in that area. Please give us some specific information on other "cheating" or loopholes in Canada's tariffs that are being exploited by a few to the disservice of many Canadians.

Glenn Black
Small Flock Poultry Farmers of Canada

Looks like Mr. Black has a double named S Thompson .

The original poster was replying to your post .
The poster did not claim chicken to be more expensive than here .
Seems some have trouble reading .

One thing Sm does do is it keeps the processing jobs here . Not like the auto industry where every factory will soon be some where other than Ontario or Canada for that fact . I don't think you can argue that you can't get chicken processed close to where you are can you ?

Yes SM has it's faults but why are some so blind that they can't seem to see the forest they are standing in ? Even Gov can't get things right . They are on the Buy Local , Buy Fresh kick ( along with other farm groups I might add ) but fail to see that jobs are leaving . The only jobs that are being created here are because Gov is using tax dollars to entice companies to set up . Even a local municipality is having a draw to give a new company free rent for a year to set up shop . Talk about pissing off any local company with the poor use of tax dollars .

Sorry guy but you continue to make the same mistake over and over again and you still wonder why you are not being listened to ! PM3

Tariff-based systems are, by first principles, net-negative for jobs and economic activity.

Therefore, instead of preserving jobs, supply management prevents jobs - sorry, but it's such a basic principle of economics that it isn't open to debate or even discussion.

There may be some unfathomable reason to keep supply management, but jobs preserved and economic activity maintained at the considerable expense of the consumer is not that reason.

Stephen Thompson, Clinton ON

Why are so many trucks with live hogs going south when we could kill and process here ? Wouldn't be that we are over priced here in our processing or over capacity ?

You need only research Food Freedom Day to find what Canadians spend on food . It is an avarage that also includes alcohol for one !

What is the tariff on farm equipment , parts and agriculture realated items ? Maybe you could move on to some thing that makes sense to agricultural readers ?

Did you sell those farms yet ? Better cash in before all the SM and hog money is gone !!
Comment modified by Editor

In reply to "Cheapest Food In World In Canada" http://betterfarming.com/comment/15944#comment-15944

This statistic is often quoted by those who wish to deny a problem exists. It is calculated by dividing the average family expenditures for food by the average family income.

Unfortunately, not everybody lives at the average wage. Not everybody has the advantages of 10 different grocery stores in a 10 km radius as does Southern Ontario and other major metropolitan area.

Unfortunately, millions of Canadians have either just one or no grocery store within accessible distances.

In Nunavut, people are asked to pay $70 to $90 for a whole chicken, unlike $16.00 in Southern Ontario, or $8.00 in USA.

This statistic, if properly calculated, should be done for each decile of the population, so that billionaires are compared separately to those living at LICO (Low Income Cutoff, the definition of poverty).

Small Flock Poultry Farmers of Canada ("SFPFC") have previously calculated the worsening unaffordability of chicken for those earning Minimum Wage in Ontario. This alternative statistic shows the affordability of chicken for Minimum Wage earners has dropped by 31.7% between 1995 to 2005. See SFPFC's Blog posting of June 17, 2014 "Unaffordable Chicken In Ontario".

Health Canada reports that 7.9% of Canadians can't afford the food they need to feed their family. Ontario, as a "Have Not" Province, is 11% worse than the Canadian average.

How can we square your unsupported assertion of best affordability of food for Canadians when all the facts show otherwise?

Glenn Black
Small Flock Poultry Farmers of Canada

And you think food prices are the problem.
And then you try and bring in Nunavut food prices.
Hysterical.
LMAO - thanks for the belly laugh.

Many people live in homeless shelters and the shelter do not have a budget to buy milk or eggs. many singles go to the food bank most months. Many people work part time or pay over half their pay cheque in rent.

Many young farmers need to off farm jobs may be we limit the price support programs to those under 35 years of age and limit to O.W. levels (Ontario Works or 10,000 per adult in the house plus 5,000 per child.

Baby bonus is no longer and would also be cheaper .

We get a money every month for our 3 kids as our income is under $30,000 per year. The other farmer is right we need to design programs to keep young people on farms in rural ontario

Non farm jobs pay 15% to 30% better than working a farm .One construction company like to hire farm workers as they are used to working 12 or 13 hour days.For many young farm boys the first time getting paid overtime.

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