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Jack Knox: No second chances for farmland

Farmland development is like virginity: You can say no a thousand times, but say yes once and it’s gone forever.
Jack Knox mugshot generic
Columnist Jack Knox

Farmland development is like virginity: You can say no a thousand times, but say yes once and it’s gone forever.

That’s why the mere suggestion that the provincial government will mess with the Agricultural Land Reserve had farming fans rushing to its defence this week, taking to the ramparts to repel the Vandal horde. A crowd of 300, dotted with local politicians and a who’s who of Saanich Peninsula farmers, packed the theatre of Sidney’s Mary Winspear Centre.

They remain suspicious of the Liberals’ intentions despite cabinet minister Bill Bennett’s assurance that there is no plan to rob the Agricultural Land Commission of its independence. The commission decides what property gets allowed out of the reserve, set up in 1974 to preserve B.C.’s rapidly disappearing farmland.

Bennett was responding to the emergence of a memo in which Agriculture Minister Pat Pimm proposed moving the commission into his ministry, with the B.C. Oil and Gas Commission given authority to permit industrial activity on agricultural land. Many of those at Mary Winspear believe Pimm’s memo reflects the true intentions of a Liberal government that is head over heels in love with natural gas to the exclusion of all else.

The thing is, whether the Liberals plan to preserve the ALR or pave it, the fight to save farmland remains a war of attrition.

B.C.’s best growing soil is in those areas with the most development potential: southern Vancouver Island, the Fraser delta, the Fraser Valley, the Okanagan.

Richmond farmer and politician Harold Steves (as in Steveston) was introduced to the crowd as the father of the ALR (which was like bringing out William Shatner at a Star Trek convention). He talked of the pressures: Port Metro Vancouver swallowing farmland for industrial use, Langley township trying to build on prime soil around Trinity Western University.

Here in the capital region, the ALR was whittled from 19,595 hectares in 1974 to 17,060 by 2010 — a loss equal to 3.5 Esquimalts.

It’s not just the easy stereotype of speculators paving paradise. A decade ago, 93 hectares was removed to allow for expansion at Royal Roads University. Road and highway projects nibble at the edges of farms. This year, the Coast Guard Auxiliary was given permission to build offices and a training centre on a two-hectare piece where some East Sooke farm buildings now sit.

The biggest issue is simply the economics of farming. Victoria residents may treasure Metchosin’s gamboling sheep and the soul-soothing agri-scenery of the Saanich Peninsula, but in reality many farmers function as low-paid wardens of unofficial parks.

The Sidney meeting heard that where there were once 22 dairy farms on the Peninsula, only a couple remain. Just two good-sized poultry farms, too. Produce is trending down, as well.

For all the farm-friendly municipal councils and locavores, the challenges don’t stop: real estate prices, irrigation, wildlife predation, regulations that look good to people with shiny shoes but lousy to those in gumboots. Many growers must augment farm income with outside jobs. Small-scale market gardeners abandon the “$10,000 ghetto” when they realize they’ll never earn enough to live.

As farms disappear, so does the support network — packing plants, feed stores, large-animal vets, professional castrators, neighbours with whom to share equipment — increasing the strain on those who are left.

The ALR isn’t perfect. Farmers complain its land-use restrictions can prevent them from adding the commercial ventures they need to survive, so they end up breaking their properties into gentrified acreages that grow nothing but a couple of horses and a Range Rover.

At least the latter properties could in theory be farmed again, though. That’s the idea of the land reserve: to keep alive the potential to grow food. Can’t do that if the field is growing condos. There are no second chances for virginity.

Steves talked about the need to add to the reserve by banking land and leasing it back to young people. Sounds nice, but don’t bet the farm on that idea finding much traction in cabinet.

Can’t get around the notion that the status quo is not enough, though. Saving the ALR alone isn’t going to save farming. Have to save the farmer, too.