Volume 6, number 11
June 3, 2002
The 'culture' of agriculture
is disappearing in Canada, taking with it some fundamental values
of human community.
Not long ago I sat with a man who was leaving his land. He was
deeply depressed. He loved to farm, his operation was financially
solid, and he had a son ready to take over.
But the vibrant community that once surrounded his farm was gone.
One farmer had bought up all the land. Gone were the churches,
stores, post office, curling rink, schools and doctor's office
that had made life in that community worth living.
Although this is an extreme case, it reflects an alarming move
away from the land. According to Census of Agriculture statistics,
30 percent of Canadian farmers left the land between 1996 and
2001. Two-thirds of their farms were taken over by new folks.
However the remaining third-10 percent of farms in Canada-were
absorbed by neighbours, creating larger farms.
Canadian farms have grown in size by 11 percent in the last 5
years, most obviously in Saskatchewan. Where the Canadian average
in 2001 was 676 acres, Saskatchewan farms averaged 1,283 acres.
Alberta came in second at 970 and Manitoba at 891 acres per farm.
The larger towns have tended to absorb those moving out of farming.
However many small communities have quietly disappeared.
With them has gone the "culture" that agri-culture once
sustained: the stories, values, patterns of life and institutions
which nourished our Canadian mosaic. For a country that values
"multi-culturalism" we seem curiously indifferent to
the cultures (especially aboriginal and rural) that have developed
on our own soil. We let them die with little more than "I
guess that's the cost of progress," while we fund uncounted
celebrations and museums that preserve cultures brought from elsewhere.
Underlying this disregard for disappearing community seems to
be a philosophy one might call "survival of the fittest."
It appears to be grounded in two modern phenomena: globalization
and industrialization. Globalization refers to the dismantling
of the world's trade and communication barriers, connecting the
world into a single large market.
In The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Thomas Friedman observes that
globalization creates a "winner-take-all" economic climate.
Consumers are able to shop the world for the best product. The
result is that certain individuals, or more likely large corporations,
reap enormous benefits, while others with just marginally less
skill or public relations do poorly. Small local businesses often
lose their livelihood. The world's resources become concentrated
in a few hands.
Devastating effects on community
Survival of the fittest thinking has devastating effects in small
communities. My interviews with rural folks indicate that the
loss of a farm or business is frequently a matter of shame. There
can be an unspoken judgement that bankruptcy is nature's (God's)
way of "cleansing" the community, ensuring that only
the fittest survive.
A winner-take-all economy ensures that shame, hiding and the depression
associated with loss become constant undercurrents leaching the
life of rural communities. Competition for land and resources
needed to get "big enough to survive" drive even deeper
wedges between community members.
The other survival of the fittest thinking has been the "mechanization"
of human society. The rapid growth of technologies, and our faith
in their ability to deliver us from all evil, has led to valuing
productivity over relationships.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, at the turn of
the twentieth century one could produce 20 bushels of wheat with
10 hours of human labour. By the 1980s, one could produce 33 bushels
with 1 hour of human labour and lots of machinery.
That 1,650 percent increase in efficiency has come at a huge cost.
The obvious cost is in machinery and inputs, a significant factor
in the loss of farms. The more troubling cost has been to human
community.
An elderly farmer lamented to me that he no longer enjoys the
harvest. The community that gathered to thrash and stook and eat
together is no longer needed. Machines don't have to rest, so
farmers work long hours through the fall nights, alone.
Our governments assess the health of agricultural communities
in terms of their productivity. Rural depopulation is seen as
a necessary adjustment to the global economy. The 1969 Federal
Task Force Report on Agriculture went so far as to conclude that
two-thirds of Canada's farmers were lazy and inefficient, and
that the government needed to develop "much more effective
policies to take men out of farming."
Productivity and efficiency are standards appropriate for measuring
machines, not people. Human communities, in order to be healthy,
must be surprisingly inefficient. Decisions must be checked out
with everyone (the basis of democracy). Restraints are placed
upon the strongest so that they don't monopolize trade or social
privilege. Relationships are an end in themselves, not a means
to increasing production.
God's experiment in social revolution
The Bible challenges the view that only the most productive deserve
to survive. Israel's history is the story of God's experiment
in social revolution. It is infused with three convictions: 1)
that God owns the land and its resources; 2) that a piece of turf
to put one's roots into is essential to human wellbeing; and 3)
God gives land to all as a gift, not to be hoarded, accumulated,
or worshiped, but as the basis for building communities.
So there were Jubilee laws that required the return of land to
the original families, and hospitality laws that created space
for strangers. Of course, Israel discovered what we have-that
human self-centredness tends to concentrate land and wealth.
Under Solomon's monarchy, and later under the Herods, high taxes
siphoned off excess food supplies that would normally carry farmers
through drought. As loans were taken out to cover the losses,
foreclosures multiplied and gradually the land passed into fewer
and fewer hands.
This concentration of land was of particular concern to the biblical
writers. The last of the 10 commandments tells us not to covet
our neighbour's "house," which refers to a family's
unit of production (one's fields, cattle, residence). In 1 Kings
21, the prophet Elijah calls down God's wrath on King Ahab's scheming
to gain Naboth's choice bit of land for himself.
Micah condemns those who "covet fields, and seize them, houses,
and take them away; they oppress householder and house, people
and their inheritance" (2:2). He warns that the land will
be re-divided.
Isaiah, in eerily modern words, pronounces judgement on a depopulated
and corporately-run rural community: "Alas, you who join
house to house, who add field to field, until there is room for
no one but you, and you are left to live alone in the midst of
the land!" (5:8).
The prophets knew what the early Christian community also discovered:
that including the weak, the broken, the shamed and the crucified
are essential to the wellbeing of the community.
As Paul says "the members of the body that seem to be weaker
are indispensable," and "if one member suffers, all
suffer with it" (1 Corinthians 12). The community is not
strengthened by weeding out the weak but "suffers" their
loss.
Making peace with the land means recovering the biblical image
of land as a home for human community. This is not to say that
all land needs to be occupied by humans. Most of the planet, the
universe, is "land" that exists for purposes known only
to God. It is to say, however, that humans are closely tied to
humus, earthlings are formed from the earth, as Genesis 2 so vividly
describes.
We all need a place to put down roots. When we keep people on
the land, in numbers sufficient to care for it properly and sustain
community without overtaxing it, then we experience a taste of
divine life. For God rejects the reduction to "one"
implied by survival of the fittest thinking. Our Triune God exists
as community.
-Cam Harder
The writer is a theologian,
farm crisis specialist and professor at Lutheran Theological Seminary
in Saskatoon.
It's the time of year when
the smell of the earth and the lengthening days beckon farmers
to the land. But conversation in the coffee shops is not focused
on new implements or what crops to plant.
"It is about who's been lucky enough to sell their farm,"
said Irene Krahn who has been farming near Carman, Manitoba, with
her husband Bill for 41 years. 
While many Mennonites have farming roots, more than half the churches
in Mennonite Church Manitoba today are in an urban setting, and
those that are rural have only a handful of farming families.
Weather, rising costs and diminishing returns remain perennial
issues, but today farmers have the added stress of dealing with
complicated environmental and ethical issues.
What are farmers saying? What role does the church play?
Ron and Marg Rempel raise 500 hogs and farm 1,500 acres in the
Steinbach area. They employ three full-time people as well as
their son in their farming operation. Theirs is considered a mid-size
farm.
Marg, who helped found the Manitoba Rural Adaptation Council,
spends nearly a quarter of her time eviewing funding proposals
that demonstrate adaptation and diversity in agriculture. Ron
is on the board of the Prairie Swine Centre, a research farm near
Saskatoon.
With the number of farmers declining, people are less and less
connected to food production.
"There is a lack of appreciation for the challenges and benefits
of what agriculture contributes to society," said Marg. "There
are lots of battles over farm size in particular." Intensive
livestock farming has ignited debate about the quality of drinking
water. The Rempels practise a careful manure management plan.
"Environmental laws are very important but the difficulty
with regulating everything is that people always push the limits."
"We respect the public dialogue a great deal," said
Rempels. "We've encouraged councillors to have open forums
to discuss the issues more broadly for all land use, not just
hearings for approval of hog barns."
"I fear that we will lose some of what's made us who we are,
that we are losing some of the local knowledge and wisdom that's
been acquired," said Marg. "Farming is not just a business
but a way of life, a connectedness to the land. There is a sense
of being co-creators with our Creator. How well do you know where
the pressures are on a system except by being as good a steward
as you can."
Rempels see the church working in small ways at this connectedness.
Community growing projects through the Canadian Foodgrains Bank
are one way farmers have tried to reconnect the church with farming
issues.
"Our church (Steinbach Mennonite) works with five other churches
on a project. We try to keep it profiled by sharing input costs
and encouraging people or groups to sponsor an acre. At harvest
we have a celebration."
"We do a number of tours of our farm each year for agriculture
students, agriculture economists, foreign delegates, and farm
writers and journalists," explained Marg. "Few farmers
want to do this because the opportunity for misunderstanding is
so great when you make yourself visible."
Bill and Irene Krahn, together with their son, work 1,600 acres.
Forty-one years in farming has taken them through many seasons
of change. They began with a mixed farm on a half a section of
land that had belonged to Irene's parents. With the introduction
of chemical fertilizers farmers gained more control over their
yields and the Krahns saw the opportunity to switch to grain farming.
"That went well until 1968," said Irene. "Then
there was no market and people had grain stockpiled on their fields."
By today's standards, their farm is considered small. "If
we have a good crop every year we can survive. The safety nets
aren't enough if you don't get a good crop."
The Krahns have been growing specialty crops such as corn and
canola because they offer more reliable markets. Genetically modified
canola seed has introduced new issues for the farmer.
"You don't use as much chemicals but a lot of countries don't
allow it into their markets," explained Irene. A growing
number of crops present similar dilemmas. "It costs $15 an
acre to spray for the corn bore. If you get crops resistant to
the corn bore or the potato beetle it eliminates some of the chemicals
but raises other fears.
"We don't know some of the long-range results of the new
GMO [genetically modified] crops: what food allergies will develop,
etc. Our nephew rented a little patch to grow a canola GMO crop
at the end of our field to see the results of cross pollination.
You wonder...."
The costs of fertilizer and machinery are too high for the prices
they can expect, said Irene. The trend will be corporate farming,
they predict. "Hutterites are the only ones that can afford
to buy farms," Irene noted. Several members of her church
recently sold their farms to a Hutterite colony.
Irene recently retired from 15 years of working in a hospital.
In the past, farm women helped with the chores. "Now women
have to go out and work," she said.
With only 7 percent of a person's budget going towards food, Canadians
lack awareness of all that goes into food production. " That
percentage will need to get a lot larger," said Irene.
Farmers are at the mercy of markets and weather. "You are
more aware of God in that situation," said Irene. "With
all the rapid changes, I still see this as part of God's plan
although there is so much we don't understand."
-Evelyn Rempel Petkau
We Canadians live in a land
of plenty. We freely roam through huge warehouses stockpiling
food of every description from all corners of the earth. Yet our
food budget represents about a dime out of every dollar we earn.
Burgers at the local fast food outlets sell two-for-one and we
are encouraged to "super-size" our orders for an extra
few cents-which increases our demand for super-size clothes. Our
plates are so full and our day-to-day life so sedentary, that
it is easier and less expensive to be fat than thin.
Many say we have a cheap food policy. But is our food system really
so cheap? Or are the real and mounting costs merely hidden from
sight?
Our food system is driving farmers out of business, even though
there is tremendous wealth generated by what they do. Farm size,
productivity and income have all risen over the past three decades-but
so have operating expenses. As a result, farmers' incomes have
followed a flat or declining line.
Farmers have coped with low prices by increasing their scale of
production. The extra production lowers prices-and the downward
spiral continues.
This is all a natural result of an industrialization process,
but our food system is looking less natural and less sustainable
all the time. An industrialized production model is expensive
even though the raw commodities it produces don't sell for much.
It is hard on the environment. There is mounting evidence that
the resource base is being eroded.
Industrialized livestock production systems are facing increased
scrutiny by animal-welfare advocates. These are not concocted
controversies. They are real issues that merit serious debate.
This system is hard on people, too. Farming has become increasingly
stressful at the same time as traditional community supports are
being eroded. The competition for land erodes the spirit of cooperation
and shared values that built rural communities. In order for one
to succeed another must fail. You cannot love your neighbour if
you are lusting after his land.
As farms become larger, rural communities decline. That reduces
the rural economy, which could offer supplemental income to farm
families and make them less reliant on volatile export markets.
We need more farmers, not fewer. Farmers are among the few groups
in our society who connect us to the land. They live daily with
the mystery of interrelationships in biological processes; they
see the constant cycle of renewal. Farmers know that doing everything
"right" is no assurance of a bountiful crop. It is truly
a gift.
As our society increasingly becomes disconnected from the land,
we become rootless and disconnected as a people. Does this mean
we should all go back to farming? Is this a pitch for organic
agriculture? No. But I think it's time we all got a little dirt
beneath our fingernails.
We need to get involved. We need to learn about the many forces
at work shaping our food production system, and we need to discuss
as a society whether the current trends in agricultural industry
will achieve the results we collectively desire.
It is only by understanding why things are the way they are that
we can have a meaningful discussion over how we want them to be.
-Laura Rance
The writer, a farm columnist
and editor in Winnipeg, is a specialist on agricultural issues
and Canada's food system.
When Manitoba farmer Harold Penner proposed (at Lethbridge 2000)
to make food issues a focus for the Mennonite Church Canada assembly
in 2002, he didn't anticipate that a two-day event would be devoted
to the topic.
Likewise for MC Canada coordinator Marilyn Houser Hamm: "I
knew that we had a big job ahead of us, but just how big was not
at all clear."
Calling for input from a reference group representing the Canadian
Foodgrains Bank, Mennonite Central Committee Food Disaster Service,
Mennonite Environmental Task Force, MCC Manitoba Agriculture Committee,
and Mennonite farmers, Hamm began planning "Making peace
with the land: A city mouse and a country mouse talk about the
pantry." The event is scheduled for July 2-3, in advance
of the MC Canada assembly.
Because of the situation in farming across Canada, "we knew
that the conference needed to substantively address the issues,"
said Hamm. "The agricultural community told us there is too
much at risk here to avoid needed dialogue and discussion around
food production. So we went to work."
Planners gave attention to providing a venue for rural and urban
participants to talk together, noting that food producers lack
opportunities to engage in meaningful conversation with consumers.
Planners hope the dialogue will inspire action at the assembly
following.
Presenters will include Chris Lind, president of St. Andrews College
in Saskatoon and a specialist in ethics and economics; Nettie
Wiebe, international leader in farm issues and professor at St.
Andrews; Cam Harder, farm crisis specialist and professor at Lutheran
Theological Seminary in Saskatoon; Laura Rance, a researcher and
writer on farm issues from Winnipeg.
Discussions with the reference group provided some surprising
results. Farmers said they did not want to be reduced to a sympathy
story-a conference in which they inform urban participants of
their hardships. Representing only one percent of the population
and a smaller and smaller link in the food chain, these food producers
are looking for a broader base to set direction for the Canadian
food system.
If you buy food, you are part of the discussion, said the farmers.
They want to talk with others about the food we eat, how it is
grown, by whom, and with what values.
The global picture of world hunger has changed, changing the mindset
of producers whose concerns have been to grow more to feed the
world.
Global population shifts and a decline in rural population on
the Canadian prairies is resulting in the loss of communities
and a way of life. What will happen as a rural way of life becomes
extinct? What values does the faith community hold that can help
build healthy rural economies and sustain the land itself?
Producers do not want to attend another conference where they
listen to experts tell them what they know already. "We need
to talk; we need to talk together," said Harold Penner, member
of the MCC Manitoba Agriculture Committee.
"Making peace with the land" is designed for dialogue,
says Hamm. "Our experts will be there, but more to journey
alongside, and to be a part of the community's discussion. And
interest from the rural community is definitely there. I hope
our urban friends will demonstrate an equal interest."
-MC Canada release
Sure there are rich and poor countries, but what exactly are developing
countries? "Poor countries turning into rich countries,"
says my teacher. "When these countries are finished developing
there won't be as much pollution and the world will be a better
place."
But if you really think about which countries pollute the most
and use the most resources, it is rich countries! So if all countries
become "first world" countries, this world is going
to die out even faster. What countries do demographers expect
will develop? Some poor countries that have small population explosions?
Sure, but that just means more people to try and support.
Poor countries need money to develop. How are they supposed to
get that? Basically, there is really no such a thing as a developing
country, if you really think about it. But how many people actually
think that far ahead these days? Not many adults, because they
do not have to be around to suffer the consequences. We kids have
to think about it; we are the future. What government official
is gonna ask a kid about something political?
Also, if all the countries get rich, who are the rich people going
to depend on to do their laundry, mow their lawn, etc.? Then there
is the infant mortality problem. How can that be fixed? Our government
and other first world governments waste a lot of money on some
pretty bogus things. Why not put that money to better use, like
health care for poorer countries? That would help lower the infant
mortality rate and raise the life expectancy.
Canada is supposed to be the "peace" country of the
world. That's great! But how about showing it more, or even trying
to influence other countries.
How can things get better? Some would say it is up to the government.
Others say it is the people and how little or much they choose
to get involved. And yet others would say that it is by trying
to accomplish peace and always being truthful.
It's all of them. The people need to choose the right people for
the government and speak up and get involved when things happen,
good or bad. Those in the government need to live up to the people's
expectations and try to accomplish peace wherever possible by
being honest, good and truthful while making good decisions.
That is it for my thoughts on this topic, but I have a lot of
other thoughts on just about every other topic. One last piece
of advice-ask a kid about their opinion on something. I bet you
would learn a lot.
-Kirsten Hamm
Kirsten's mother, Marilyn
Houser Hamm, noticed one evening that her
12-year-old daughter's homework dealt with the theme of "Making
peace with the land," so she asked Kirsten what she thought.
Next evening, the above comments were waiting for Marilyn on her
computer.
Calling young people
If you're in elementary or
high school and would like to share your thoughts about "Making
peace with the land," send us an article, poem or work of
art. The theme includes things like: what farmers and grocery
store shoppers should know about each other; how to take care
of the earth; learning about God's will for creation. Some submissions
will be published in Canadian Mennonite. All the material will
be collected in a booklet. Send to: Marilyn Houser Hamm, Mennonite
Church Canada, 600 Shaftesbury Blvd., Winnipeg, MB R3P 0M4.
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