Pine Lake History - 1976 - 1989

              Farmers ` must promote agriculture'
to glow loss of land TheLetlibridneHerald
How Food Lets
sponsored by
The
of our agricultural industry . The Women's Institute feelsit i
everyone's responsibility to insure that AGRICULTURE remains
" Our Renewable Resource",
Rules o£ the Foster Contest
3 .
C .
6 .
7 .
8 .
purpose of the
through :
By RIC SWIHART
Herald Business Writer
Farmers must do a better job promoting
their industry If they expect to slow the loss
of farmland to urban sprawl, industry and
road construction, an Alberta Women's In-stitute
panel speaker said Wednesday .
And consumers must be educated to ac-cept
higher food prices, allowing farmers,
especially young ones, to combat the eco-nomic
plight created by high land, produc-tion
and interest costs, other panel
members told 40 farm wives at a seminar in
the Park Plaza Motor Hotel .
Holly Hollett of Carstairs said govern-ment
policy lacks guidelines to protect the
agricultural land base .
" The regulations here have been a long
time coming, and there are a lot that aren't
coming," she said in an interview.
Stronger regulations governing subdivi.
sions should be a priority, said Hollett. But
before such changes are po4sible, everybody
must become involved in regional planning
work .
Hollett said the County of Mountain View
has taken the lead in land use regulations,
limiting subdivision of arable land to I60-
acre parcels. Non- arable land can be subdi-vided
into parcels as small as two acres .
Public education is a majorjob of agricul-ture,
she said .
" Everybody says there is a lot of agricul-tural
land," she said . " But by the year 2000,
1 .7 million acres will be taken out of produc-tion
in CMPa. 14 f b a arc
She said the amount of land taken out of
production by road systems is
contest
Ira Lawrence
CONTEST
To Our Ta.
PINE LAKE V101 .1E17' S INSTITUTE
is to create a greater awareness
The Contest is open to anyone attending school from
First and second Drizes of 510 .00 and S5 .00 will be
to the following categories :
Or . 10- 12 .
Brochures will be provided
be taken .
larticipants are required
be crovided on request .
15artha luosher
" unbelievable . ,,
And industry has a responsibility to save
farm land, she said. Petrochemical plants
built recently near Red Deer should have
been farther east, on less productive land .
She said some of Alberta's best land is in
the Red Deer- Calgary corridor, and the
province and private developers have al-ready
bought a1W land between Airdrie
and Calgary at $ 2,000 to $ 16,000 an acre .
But farmers have a more immediate bat-tle
with consumers, said Shirley Reinhardt
of Rockvford, to convince them that food is
the best bqv on the market .
She said most consumers buy groceries at
a supermarket, but spend only 30 per cent of
their shopping money for food . Seventy per
cent of the money spent in supermarkets is
for non- food merchandise among the 10,000
items in a typical store .
Reinhardt said farmers must work hard
to change their image as millionaires .
In 1949, the average Canadian's dispos-able
income was $ 921 and his grocery bill $ 20
a week . In 1981, the average was $ 4,700 while
the grocery bill had increased to $ 96 a
week .
" Although food prices have increased, it
takes less than half as long to make the
money to buy the groceries," she said .
In the same 32- year period, consumers
have increased spending for cars, houses,
travel and entertainment six times and in-creasing
bank savings seven times .
" We have seen the total amount paid for
food increase four times, but farm incomes
haven't increased proportionately," said
Reinhardt
Cr . 1- 12
awarded
Gr . 1- 3, Gr . 4- 6, Gr . 7- 9, and
from which information facts shout .
to use the poster paper which v. ill
Poster paper will be available
886- 462E
886- 4886
Doris marke
students may use any means they prefer to create a poster
e . g . words, drawings, paints, crayons, pictures cut from
magazines, etc .
Individual entries only .
Only one entry per student .
All posters will become the property of the Pine Lake W . I .
Fosters will be used for display purposes at the discretion
the branch .
The Student's NAIFE, ADDRESS, AGE, GRADE must be on the back
of the poster in the bottom right hand corner .
Deadline for completed entries is 1 ay 11, 1982
to any of the three ladies mentioned above .
Posters will be judged on the following :
( a) Accuracy of information
( b) Appealing design
227- 2062
to be
s
of
submitted
March 11, 1982
Low farm incomes have forced farmors
to become more efficient and to prods[!
surplus stocks to increase inoomn, but con-sumers
benefit most through reaching de-pressed
food prices .
Marion Brown of Pine lake said con-stantly-
rising production costs have forced
more Alberta farmers to take off- farm em-ployment
to maintain production .
Less than one- third of farm income is
earned on farms, she said, mainly became
farmers receive only about 38 cents of the
consumer food dollar .
Brown said consumers must realize that
if Canadian farmers don't make a profit,
the country will have to rely more on foreign
food suppliers .
Alternatives to farm profits include in-creased
off- farm employment, more mar-keting
boards, land banking that would kill
farmer pride In ownership or more credit-card
grocery purchases, she said.
Agriculture accounts for only three per
cent of the Alberta population, but provides
30 per cent of the jobs. " The food and bever-age
industry in Edmonton is more impoi3ant
economically than the oil industry ."
Laurene Kiemele of Cardston said farad
problems are similar across the province .
She said consumers must rearrange
priorities to help keep farmers in indepen- .
dent production.
Kiemele said the deadline for continua-tion
and expansion of farms is nearing, and
only increased spending from consumers
will save agriculture since it is impossible to
save significant amounts in the cost of
production.
L- R : Beverly Sawyer, Beverly
Edmundson, Teresa Vincent, Stacy
Ziegler, Cathy Lawrence, Nlargo
Lawrence, Honda Holt, Jason
Edmundson, David Holt