News

In the face of the growing global food crisis, the supply management system for Canada's 14,660 family dairy farmers should serve as a model of reason and balance in providing consumers with healthy, fairly priced products. But there have been misguided calls lately, including in the mainstream news media, for dismantling this system to achieve undefined and illusory benefits.

In past global trade talks, Canadian negotiators have successfully defended dairy, egg and poultry producers' supply management system from outside pressure. The ministerial-level talks that started yesterday in Geneva are yet another bid to end seven years of deadlock in the Doha development round, but Ottawa's determination to preserve the system should be maintained.

It is a myth that Canadian dairy farmers receive Canadian government subsidies. The supply management system, first introduced in 1966, is based on three pillars: production discipline, producer pricing and import control.

Supply management simply gives provincial producer organizations the ability to negotiate fair prices. They share the same objective as the fair-trade coffee shops that have sprung up like mushrooms all over Canada: ensuring that producers, who get their entire income from the market, are treated equally.

Import controls ensure that Canadian markets are not undermined by imports from foreign producers, such as European Union countries, which heavily and directly subsidize their own farmers. They also ensure that our market is preserved against price spikes due to shortages.

Undermining just one of these three pillars would weaken Canada's entire supply management system. Allowing more imports, for example, would undermine farmers' ability to efficiently plan production while maintaining enough income to keep them on their farms. Knowing the level of imports allows Canadian farmers to fill most domestic demand for poultry, eggs and dairy products, without producing excess.

These are especially trying times for all of Canada's agricultural industry. The strength of the dollar against other major currencies has discouraged exports and encouraged imports. Feed, fertilizer and fuel costs are also soaring at a time when profits on family farms are razor thin.

Dairy Farmers of Canada understands the importance of a successful global trade agreement that reduces government subsidies and improves access to new markets. But the negotiations are unlikely to have any real impact on trade-distorting support in the United States and Europe. That support is not being reduced, but repackaged.

It is important to recognize that dairy is one of Canada's first and most important industries, and its continued health is vital to the country's economy. It generates employment for 160,000 people, making it one of the largest employers in agriculture.

Milk production on farms supports $30-billion in economic activity in Canada, adding $9.7-billion to Canada's gross domestic product each year. Milk sales at the farm gate last year were $5.5-billion, while the value of processed dairy products, including cheese and yoghurt, was $13-billion.

The dairy industry is vital to Canada's economy and consumers. Now is not the time to erode key, legitimate protections for our industry for the sake of a face-saving global trade agreement that may not bring real benefits.

Canadians need a healthy and self-sustaining dairy industry, and the industry needs and expects the support of its government at these trade talks.

Jacques LaForge is president of Dairy Farmers of Canada.