Editor:
I'm so tired of listening to the B.S. about saving the farmland here in Delta.
I'm a fifth generation grower and I grow over 500 acres of potatoes, peas and beans in Delta. I chose this line of work because I was born into it and didn't know any better.
We can't compete with the U.S. or the other western provinces. The cost of doing business here is too high and there is always a surplus of food.
Governments promote a surplus to keep food cheap and to keep their votes.
We have hundreds of tons of potatoes still in storage from last year that there is no market for and will most likely get dumped.
Washington state averages over double the yield per acre of potatoes. Go ahead and look at its website.
We grow peas and beans for processing, and if you get the average yield, you just cover your basic cost of production, not including management wages. If we try to get more money, then we will lose our last remaining processors as it can be grown cheaper in Washington or Alberta.
Farming is a business, not a charity. We sell to the highest bidder. Buying local doesn't mean anything unless you want to pay more, which most people don't want to do. We export 80 per cent of what we grow so where is the buy local? It's more B.S.
Some government people use fear as a tactic to keep farmland, or should I say free green space, around.
The ALR took away the right to subdivide and the right to develop from farmers without compensation.
The provincial NDP government promised it would not buy it back at the reduced values when it did this in the early 1970s. However, this promise has been broken.
The ALR is not fair. While some people benefit when land is removed, others don't. The ALR should be abolished.
Food security comes in having money to buy food, not having some heavy clay soil that is saturated nine months of the year.
We have a poor climate for growing crops and clay soil that turns to cement when saturated.
In 2010, we lost 80 per cent of our crops due to flooding; this is a common occurrence about every three years. People can only eat so many berries and greenhouse tomatoes, which is all this climate is suited for.
Technology in agriculture has made many advances that have increased yields and reduces the need for farmland. Most people have no idea how advanced the farming systems are now.
There is also vertical farming or high-rise farming that will reduce the need for farmland.
We all love green space, so the right thing to do is to purchase it, not steal it through legislation.
Trevor Harris
