New London, PEI -
A national strategy that champions domestically produced food over foreign imports must be developed or Canadian farmers could become little more than glorified gardeners running petting zoos, says a leader with the Canadian Federation of Agriculture.
"Food sovereignty is going to become a critical issue in Canada and we have to ask ourselves: 'Do we want to be beholding to other nations for our food?'" said Grant Etsell during the Prince Edward Island Federation of Agriculture's annual meeting here on the weekend (Jan. 30-31).
Etsell fired a volley of warning shots to farmers, including the little care the World Trade Organization has for farmers on a planet that already produces surplus amounts of food.
He said Canada can barely remain competitive against such giants as South America that has become a leader in grain, fruit and livestock production and reaps twice the harvests per year.
"We need a food strategy that says feed Canada first with our food," said Etsell, Canadian federation's second vice-president.
"We can sink our heads in the sand and maintain the status quo, but that would relegate farmers to welfare citizens in some capacity and nothing more than gardeners and livestock producers nothing more than petting zoos."
The B.C. farmer cautioned that Canadian food production is being supplanted by foreign imports and that trend will continue unless changes are made to ensure domestic food is given priority.
"We need to regulate foreign imports and create environments that encourage investment in the production of Canadian food."
Etsell said while Canadian farmers are forced to follow stringent guidelines when producing food, such standards are barely applied when it comes to foreign goods.
He also said food labelling efforts by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency have been a fiasco and lost all credibility since - in many instances - the only Canadian content in some food packages is the wrapping.
"Canada has to step up to the plate regarding trade negotiations and demand our domestic products comes first," he said.
"Currently we allow ourselves to fall down and let everyone pile on top of us."
