In the fields and the barns, we farmers grow food and raise livestock to feed others across Canada, and the world. We understand food systems, we continually strive to adopt new technologies and pest practices. We understand how to feed people. We are proud stewards of this land. Yet, it seems our government, through Bill C-293, has completely overlooked agriculture’s critical role in Canada’s food security, dismissively overlooking it as a backbone of this country. The spirit of Bill C-293, with its push for government control over many aspects of our lives, equates to a modern-day “let them eat cake”!
At first glance, the reasoning behind Bill C-293 seems benign: ensure we’re ready for the next pandemic. Upon closer inspection – and especially for people with roots in agriculture – the bill is far more dangerous than it appears. Bill C-293 represents government intrusion into our food choices and a tangible threat to the food systems so many of us know and depend on. If it becomes law, with no qualifications, Bill C-293 would interfere with farmers’ ability to do their jobs. Bill C-293 threatens the future of Canadian food production. And it would tip us all towards an insect-protein diet we never asked for in the first place.
The Hidden Threat to Meat Production
Right out of the gate, let’s focus on the most sinister part of Bill C-293. Cracked open like a dried pea pod, is the exhortation for governments to ‘de-risk’ clustered, ‘chronically vulnerable’ sectors deemed to be pandemic risks. Top of the list? Animal protein production. The bill publicly commissions the production of ‘alternative proteins’, a term most of us would know as the government setting its bureaucratic sights on reducing meat consumption, pushing us into plant-based and insect-based diets. This is a top down declaration of “Let them eat bugs.”
Dr Sylvain Charlebois, a professor of food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University in Halifax, who has written extensively about global food trade, has called it “Canada’s Vegan Act” because of the power this law gives to government health authorities to decide what is and isn’t safe in terms of food production during a pandemic, and enable them to shutter meat processing facilities they deem to be too high a risk. What it does encourage, either directly or indirectly, is plant-based and other forms of proteins, such as insects.
If this will become a reality: a time when chefs and grocery stores feature cockroach tacos and grasshopper mayonnaise; a time when drive-thrus serve fried worm burgers and grasshopper bacon strips; a time when our government subsidizes cricket farms and mealworm burgers become the new premium items, then most of our farmers, who dedicate their lives day in and day out to raise the best beef, pork, and poultry, will go out of business. Competing with government-favored businesses does not pencil out, as the government continues to burden free enterprise with taxes, red tape and media hostility.
A Dangerous Precedent for Government Overreach
Bill C-293 is also a deeply concerning expansion of governmental control over agriculture. Empowering public health officials to seize unprecedented powers to shutter allegedly ‘risky’ operations hands over the proverbial keys to farm facilities and operations to public health bureaucrats who may not know the first thing about farming. What they may unjustly identify as risk, we identify as well-researched, routine operation and best practices when it comes to the regular health and welfare needs of our livestock.
It is not only the ability to close down meat-processing plants that is alarming, but the entire agricultural supply chain. Employment restrictions under pandemic protocols could make it impossible for farms to move animals, inputs such as feed and fertilizer, or final product to market. Such restrictions would cripple the industry, and with Canada’s high level of food trade, we are likely to face empty shelves and high prices on foods that we have grown accustomed to having readily available.
Worse still, such overreach doesn’t stop with instances of public health crisis. Once the precedent is set that the government has the ability to regulate our consumption in the name of public health, where does it stop? Should meat production become heavily taxed because of its environmental risks? Should certain forms of farming be banned?
The vagueness of the bill leaves the door very much open to escalating government overreach.
Is This What Canadians Want?
Proponents of Bill C-293 will argue that alternatives to meat products, such as bugs are indeed sustainable, a source of nutritious protein and the way of the future. But is this what most Canadians want? We have foods of our choosing, grown & raised locally, with pride and purpose. Many of us enjoy eating beef, chicken, pork, grains, lentils, etc. and the nourishment they provide to our families. Bill C-293 infringes upon our dietary freedoms by making it more difficult to produce the foods we have eaten for generations, all while gently nudging us towards “sustainable” alternatives.
And, clearly, it’s not really a choice about personal preference or tastes: this is about food security. When we choose to take our ability to produce meat offline in favour of growing more insects, or culturing food in test-tubes, those are lost skills – our national food sovereignty would be undermined. Insisting that we go there regardless, because it sounds sustainable, cedes our freedom and paves the way for perpetual government overreach.
Let Them Eat Bugs
Being coerced towards eating bugs is only a small part of the catastrophic effects this bill, if it makes it through the Senate, will have on our lives. The truth is, Bill C-293 puts us on a slippery slope toward an extreme ending where we lose control of the decisions we make about our food. Using swift action to give us more protection from pandemics might end up simply determining what ultimately ends up on our plates.
As farmers, and in many ways as Albertans who are continually facing government overreach, we are losing control to a burgeoning & bloated federal government… and we end up holding the short end of the stick. Though our federal government may not be aware, we have a proud farming history in Canada and it is in everyone’s best interests to protect it. We must push back against this creeping overreach before we’re told to literally eat bugs.
For those who might be tempted to call this hyperbole, I say this: Look at the bill’s language. Look at the slow, yet unmistakable, slide towards other proteins. Once that door is open for government control of our diet, who knows what is next? And as an old proverb states: “those who control the food control the people”. Bill C-293 is about control. And if the government continues so close-mindedly in their pursuits of power, let THEM eat bugs.
Tanya Clemens
FarmGeek