Mr. Speaker, we cannot make bread without grain and we cannot have grain without farmers.
My constituent Miles Moore recently hauled 1,100 bushels of number two hard spring wheat to a grain elevator. The grain was shipped out of the province and used to make approximately 66,000 loaves of bread which netted $100,000. Mr. Moore got $3,000 for his part.
We will not have farmers like Mr. Moore anymore. Agriculture Canada statistics show a mind-boggling negative $486 million net realized income for Saskatchewan farmers in 2005.
The government's agriculture programs are complicated and ineffective. They have led Mr. Moore and others to ask, “Would any one citizen in Canada deny a Canadian farmer 10% of the retail value of the food that farmer's crop produced?”
This government's agriculture policies need to better respond to the dire straits of our farmers in Canada.