For immediate release:
October 31, 2008

Barrett goes to bat for young farmers
HN MPP questions Ag. Minister about shortfalls in support programs

Queens Park – MPP Barrett brought the plight of young hog farmers to the doorstep of Ontario’s Agriculture Minister this week.

Barrett took two separate opportunities to question the Minister about what the Province can do for young farmers who have fallen through the cracks of Ontario’s safety net programs – specifically referencing the situation of Wayne and Geoff Bartels.

“Yesterday I toured a 600-sow wing of Bartside Farms. It's a hog operation between Empire Corners and Sinclairville,” Barrett reported in the Legislature. “Their line of credit just dropped from $250,000 to $170,000 and they've eaten up most of a $400,000 loan just over this past summer. They have missed out on the $100,000 that they expected from the program.”

Barrett went on to pose a series of questions:

“(1) Is Ag Minister Dombrowsky making any headway, now that she has been fully briefed on this shortfall in the program, on the fact that many young and beginning farmers have been missed, not only in hog production but also in beef and horticulture?

(2) Will Minister Dombrowsky meet with these overlooked farmers?

(3) Will this Ontario government be working on a new program to assist those farmers who had little or no financial data available between 2000 and 2004?”

Earlier in the day Barrett addressed the Minister directly on the same issue.
“Is there any suggestion of any kind of an add-on program? We understand that there'll be taxation data becoming available soon that may identify those like the Bartels family, who just began in the hog business a few years ago,” stated Barrett. “So if new financial data from 2007 would be made available, is there a way that we could work through this just to capture these other young farmers? I can assure you, I spent all morning in the barn, and these guys, just by timing, got caught.”

The Minister would not commit to any new add-on benefits.
 

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For more information please contact MPP Barrett at 1-800-903-8629