Fruit growers get CanAdapt re-leaf
Horticultural research got a shot in the arm recently from CanAdapt in the form of a $131,300 grant for fertilizer testing.Eight demonstration plots in Niagara Penninsula vineyards and orchards are currently being assessed to determine how growers can get the most for the least out of fertilizer applications.
Tom Greensides, director of the Agricultural Adaptation Council, which oversees the CanAdapt program, says the research is looking for "better information on when nutrients should be applied to get the best results." And applying only what is needed at the right time should reduce input costs, he says.
The key is in-season tissue analysis, says Greensides. Testing starts with emerging leaves in the spring, he says: "Do the leaves have all the tools available to do the job?" is what researchers want to know. Growers - whose participation in the program is voluntary - make soil adjustments based on lab results as the season progresses. Leaf testing continues about once a month, says Greensides.
The aim of the three-year project is to demonstrate to growers the benefits of regular leaf analysis, he says. Increased production and a better quality product are the anticipated result, but Greensides admits that farmers will have to offset the cost of lab testing against reduced inputs before determining the economic benefits.
Farmers have said they like what they see so far, says Greensides, but the proof will be in the harvest. - Christina Selby
© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.
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Farm tour time
In autumn, when an urbanite's fancy turns to thoughts of falling leaves and bucolic scenes, opportunity knocks for farmers, according to Suzanne Lavoie, organizer of Agri-Tour in Prescott Russell, east of Ottawa.When Agri-Tour was launched in 1996, an average of 300 tourists visited 16 non-traditional farms featuring llamas, ducks and alpaca wool. Last year the number of visitors per farm doubled, resulting in brisk sales and ongoing business for individual producers.
Dates for this year's tours are Sept. 12 and 13. Admission is free. Call 1-800-361-7439. There are group tours plus lunch on Sept. 11.
Renfrew county's fourth annual Rural Ramble is scheduled for Sept. 26 and 27. Pat Egan, a key organizer of the county Agri-Food Education Committee, says the program was launched in 1995 when the Ottawa Valley Tourist Association (OVTA) contacted her group to capitalize on momentum generated by the 1994 International Plowing Match in Pembroke.
"Motels, campgrounds and restaurants were full for a week. They really had their eyes opened," recalls Egan.
The co-operative venture among farmers, rural businesses, commodity groups and OVTA groups costs about $10,000, about the same as Prescott Russell spends.
Egan, a former Ontario Pork director, operates a farrow-to-finish operation near Cobden with her husband Mike and family. During Rural Ramble they allow visitors, clad in plastic boots supplied by the pork board, to wander through their barns. It's one of more than 20 attractions on the Ramble.
Adults spend $5 for a passport to visit host businesses. Children under 12 attend free. Call 1-800-757-6580 or check out the website www.ottawavalleyag.org - Robert Irwin
© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.
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OFA and CFFO question Hydro split
Provincial Energy Minister Jim Wilson has a dream. He wants to see Ontario Hydro turn healthy profits and win customers all over the Northeastern U.S.Whether Wilson is a soothsayer or a salesman will be determined over the next couple of years as the government prepares to split up Hydro's assets and services, and open Ontario's electricity market to competition.
Ontario's farm groups have been watching the process with interest, trying to determine how the privatization putsch will affect rural Ontario.
Ontario Federation of Agriculture executive member Peter Canning says the federation has been focusing on a number of issues presented by the Energy Competition Act, including the status of existing easement and right-of-way agreements. Canning says farmers need to know whether those agreements will be honoured by new utilities as Hydro's assets are transferred to private companies.
Canning says farmers also need to know the fate of Hydro's multi-billion dollar debt. He wants to know how much of the debt will be passed on to new utilities, filling the service void left by Hydro's breakup. If new utilities are strapped with Hydro's stranded debt, "generation companies will pass on the charges to the supply companies who will in turn pass it on to the consumer," Canning says.
Whether Hydro assets are sold at market value or depreciated value could have major impact on the future cost of electricity, he says.
"If we get it at market value and have to pay off the debt, we could be looking at some massive increases here," says Canning.
The OFA is also concerned with the future of rural rate assistance. The program has been maintained in the new legislation, but there is a "grey area," Canning says. Until now, assistance has been restricted to year-round residential and farm customers of Ontario Hydro. But the Act redefines eligibility requirements along geographical lines, saying designated customer classes in "rural and remote areas" would be eligible for assistance. Canning says the OFA will be asking for clarification on the issue to determine whether farmers could fall through the cracks.
The Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario has also been scrutinizing the legislation. CFFO research director Elbert van Donkersgoed thinks more players in the marketplace could be a bonus, but "we're not convinced we're going to see the competitiveness we see in the telephone service.
"Very honestly, we've had a hard time getting excited about it," van Donkersgoed says. Farmers in remote areas under a private system "will find it more difficult, more expensive, to be serviced," he says. "The unified monopoly subsidized all kinds of things," including farmers in remote parts of Ontario.
Van Donkersgoed says to build the infrastructure necessary, "we're going to need some kind of subsidy that a private sector deliverer isn't going to provide. The initial building of the infrastructure needed public support to get it out to rural Ontario."
Good infrastructure is the key to good economy - roads, power, and information, he says. "If that doesn't exist, it's very difficult for the entrepreneur."
The Act has received second reading and will be brought back to the legislature in the fall. - Bernard Tobin
© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.
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Romney rung out?
Parents of children from Romney Central School watched in despair earlier this summer as school officials packed up the chalk and erasers and removed desks from the 150-student Kent county elementary school.In July, the Lambton Kent District School Board voted to close Romney and H.A. Tanser School in Chatham. East Sombra Central School, near Wallaceberg, was the third area school on the chopping block, but trustees voted to keep it open.
The school rooms at Romney Central are empty and dark, but parents say they will fight to have the school reopened, says Port Alma's Kim Klassen, a mother of three whose youngest son, Paul, finished Grade 6 at Romney in June.
"There is a ray of hope," says Klassen. "If you can clean out a school in two weeks, you can put it back together."
After fighting an intense grassroots battle to convince school board trustees to save the school, parents have taken their case to the provincial government. Last month, parents from Romney and schools in neighbouring Lambton and Essex journeyed to Queen's Park to drum up support.
The Ontario Federation of Agriculture is also coming forward to lobby on behalf of rural parents. "I think we have to change attitudes," says OFA executive member Ron Bonnett. "There's a tendency to look at a rural school as an appendix. You can just cut off that school and your problem goes away and you can bus the students in to the urban centres."
Bonnett says the OFA will ask Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Minister Noble Villeneuve to go to bat for rural schools. "I think we have to have somebody speaking up for rural Ontario at the Cabinet table," says Bonnett.
"I don't think it's a deliberate attempt by the school boards to attack rural Ontario. I think it's just a lack of understanding of what a rural school is. That's where we've got to put our main push. We have to make these boards understand that they're just not dealing with a building, but part of the mosaic of rural life. In a lot of rural areas, a school is a recreation centre, it's a meeting place."
Bonnett says the provincial government's new education funding model, which ties school funding to enrollment, discriminates against rural schools. That's why it's important to involve OMAFRA, which is responsible for rural affairs, he says.
As for Paul Klassen, when he returns to school this month, he faces a 90-minute round trip to Wheatley Area Public School. But at press time mother Kim had not decided whether she would send her son to the urban school chosen by the school board. She is holding out hope that the nine o'clock bell at Romney may yet ring again. - Bernard Tobin
© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.
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