Not on the Backs of Farmers

Lori Stahlbrand is the founder of Local Food Plus, an NGO that runs a local and sustainable food certification process in order to support regional food economies. “[The price of food is] below the cost of production and it means that farmers cannot make a living.”

At the same time farmers are struggling to make a living, some people in Nova Scotia are unable to afford the local, organic food that they grow.

Cathy Johnson, a wife and mother who supports her family on income assistance, recognizes this tension clearly. “We live under the poverty line. And I know that the farmers do too.”

Despite the surge of interest in local food, farms and farmers are disappearing across the country. Young farm operators are dwindling. Only seven per cent of farmers are below the age of 35, according to Statistics Canada, while 45 per cent of farmers are above the age of 55. Furthermore, every year since 1991, the average age of farmers has increased by one.

An over reliance on food imports in Nova Scotia is cited as one major problem. Markets are flooded with cheaper alternatives that force local prices below a level that would allow the farmer a living wage. As a result, says Stahlbrand, “We have more farmers leaving or selling their land to developers.” This trend is having a profound effect on the local food system, which relies on the diversity and plurality of local farms to be strong and resilient, notes David Greenberg, a farmer and educator, who warns, “We have an unstable, insecure industrial food model right now that just cannot handle the challenges coming up...The only way to have food security long term in the province is to have lots of viable farms.”

Strahlbrand argues the future of food security in Nova Scotia will rely on a shift in how we value food and how much we are willing to pay for it. “In Canada we pay the lowest for our food of any country in the world,” she says. “In Canada and the United States people on average spend about 10 per cent of their income on food. And if you look at Western Europe, Japan, or the UK, you'll find that people are spending anywhere from 25-30 per cent of their income on food, depending on the country you look at.”