How you define farmer matters.

[gustgd]

http://www.producer.com/2012/05/statistics-
canada-must-rethink-how-it-defines-farmers-
for-census-purposes/

Statistics Canada must rethink how it defines
farmers for census purposes
Posted May. 18th, 2012 No Comments

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Let’s be clear from the get-go.?

Statistics Canada is a national treasure, its
data collection illuminates Canadian history
as it evolves and the Conservative decision
to diminish its ability to gather information
is a shortsighted ideological mistake.?

Much of the agricultural industry depends on
Statistics Canada to tell the tale of what is
happening as the world and the sector
evolves.?

So none of this is to denigrate the value of
the work Statistics Canada does.?

It is, however, to suggest that the federal
agency should rethink how it collects farm
data and in particular, how it defines a
farm.?

Statistics Canada data on the state of
farming, the number of farms, farm size, farm
income and farm sales distorts the reality of
Canadian agriculture today.?

It defines a farm as an operation producing
an agricultural product with the “intention”
of selling it.?

There is no need to actually have sold a
cabbage, to have a minimum farm sales income,
to even have the intention of trying to make
money from the farm.?

So Canada had more than 205,000 farmers last
year. That hasn’t been true for decades.?

So Canada lost more than 10 percent of its
farms between 2006 and 2011. Not a chance.?

So the average farm size is 778 acres. That
is so 1960.?

This is no academic argument. ?

Federal and provincial agriculture ministers
use the data as they design national farm
policy, a process that is now underway and
that will establish farm policy for the next
five years, starting next April 1.?

Urban media use the data to describe what is
happening on the farm. My God, more than
23,000 farmers went out of business in five
years.?

And while the federal agency presents copious
amounts of detail about the breakdown of
segments within agriculture, the broader
averages are what catch the headlines and
fuel the political questions about
agricultural policy failures.?

So here is a modest proposal.?

Statistics Canada should create a definition
of a “farm,” perhaps in collaboration with
Agriculture Canada.?

Someone living on an acreage as a want-to-be
farmer with a fantasy of selling tomatoes in
the local farmers’ market should not qualify
as a farmer.?

While it is politically charged and would
take years of painful political and
statistical debate, Statistics Canada should
try to come up with a way to identify farmers
who hope to make a living from growing food
and differentiate them from someone who wants
the lifestyle and wants to tap into the
spirit of Grandpa and his pre-mechanized
farm.?

Agriculture Canada should insist that its
sister government agency find a way to
determine how many serious commercial farmers
there are so that agricultural and social
policy do not become interchangeable.?

Years ago, a federal deputy agriculture
minister with a cattle herd wrote off losses
on the farm against his government salary
because he saw himself as a farmer with
Ottawa as off-farm income.?

A federal court ruled that to be a ludicrous
idea.?

Likewise, Statistics Canada should not allow
want-to-be farmers to self-identify and
thereby skew valuable, informative statistics
that are the lifeblood of the industry

[Hopperbin]

A farmer should be anyone growing a crop with in excess of 4200 acres. Then maybe they will quit pestering me.

[Horse]

trere are those that dont need thousands of acres to produce a large income 3 acres chicken barn over 1 mill in sales greenhouses, hog barns feedlots ect get over thinking how big and important you are because you can throw around big acerage numbers.

[wd9]

I'd rather have 20 acres of a high value
Pharming crop than be a monkey in a
glass box that doesn't even have to
steer hour after hour after hour after
hour after hour after hour after hour
after hour after hour after hour after
hour after hour after hour after hour
after hour after hour after hour after
hour after hour after hour after hour
after hour.

Definition of a farmer is for the income
tax act. CG claw backs,
intergenerational CG etc. The guise of
"how many acres you farm" is just a
smokescreen for the data the gov really
wants which is how to tax more
effectively.

[freewheat]

In 20 years, stats can has NEVER asked my
opinion of anything.

[ALLFARMER]

I have never answered...and they quit asking.

If I wanted to do paperwork why did I go
farming?

[gustgd]

Did some of you even read the article? I know the format is tough but I provided the address. It's left click copy paste.

I agree that it's not the number of acres that matter, but farm profitability and contribution to the Canadian economy that matter. Hell our farm might be someone else's rounding error but where is that cut off.

The point I think should be made is that governments should not be using tax dollars to fund someones hobby. Where do we put that line? I think that it might be accrual $50,000.00 net farm in a grain farm. Olympic average maybe. What should it be for cattle, other Ag sectors. Do I have it right on the $50K. WD-9's idea of line 150 is a good one.

The point of the post was not Stats Cans fascination with my "pineapple" crop and his start saying Stats Can is a National treasure is as another pointed out. "a stretch"

[theplowboy]

I really don't mind if the politicians think there are 200,000 farmers in Canada. Maybe they will support us a little better.

If there are only 20,000 large scale operations defined as farmers we will have no political clout at all.