The Hill Times – Agriculture Policy Briefing
This week, the Hill Times published a special policy edition in its weekly paper focused entirely on agriculture.
Serge Buy, CEO of AIC, was featured in three articles where he provided comment on a number of issues facing the sector including supply management, potential changes to NAFTA and the impact of rising electricity costs.
When discussing the concern for farmers in rural areas with already high energy costs and anticipating the new carbon-tax environment, Serge says that there is a role for the federal government in electricity prices, even though this is a provincial jurisdiction.
“I am all in favour of looking at it and developing policy that addresses climate change, but I’m not in favour of putting in place policies that are going to create significant economic damage for rural regions,” said Mr. Buy.
The Agricultural Institute of Canada will be holding a conference in Winnipeg from April 24 to 26 on the topic of agricultural innovation as it relates to climate change.
Mr. Buy said key parts of agriculture infrastructure, such as processing plants or research organizations, look at the costs of being located in a region and may choose to go somewhere else if the cost of energy is too high.
“I think the federal government needs to bring the provinces together and look at the cost of energy and how every is regulated and see whether or not the federal government can assist the provinces with their costs,” he said.
To read the articles, click here to subscribe to the special edition of the Hill Times.