It was interesting to see a recent story about the recent Cairns Group ministerial meeting in Saskatoon. It marked the first time group members discussed ways scientific innovations and rules-based trade may help meet global food security objectives.
The idea of food security is one we should consider for a variety of reasons.
On one hand, the basic idea is one we should generally embrace. Safe food is important for us all since food is one of life's essential. On the other hand, the more rules established around food security, the greater the red tape and costs farmers are likely to face in marketing their crops and livestock.
We have deemed food traceability a key aspect of food safety and that means all the way from the farm gate to the kitchen table. And while the processing sector will be able to pass on its costs to consumers, farmers are not likely to see new costs factored into what they receive from the marketplace.
There is however, a growing question about whether we are maybe going so far in establishing rules that in the process, we are about to lose a huge part of our food heritage.
I think about one of my favourite shows on television right now regarding food; Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern. The host travels the world eating the weirdest foods he can find, possum and raccoon in the Ozarks; whole deep fried chicks and partially incubated eggs in the Orient; worms, bugs, tarantulas and in almost every country, some of his favourite foods are found being sold by street vendors.
That has always been something I have thought my city of Yorkton lacked, a street vendor selling perogies and hot dogs.
Of course to operate such a business now in Canada is something where people need to be ready to work through a ton of regulations to make it a go.
And it goes farther. A rib barbecue competition at the local summer fair took a long visit from health inspectors to get the go ahead.
Yes, safety is important, but backyard barbecues are not exactly alien science competitors we're foreign to.
An upcoming cultural event in the city isn't sure cultural foods will be part of the offerings because the regulations are simply daunting.
Neighbourhood and community potluck suppers, and even the farmers' market sale of cooked goods is becoming ever more difficult.
Do we need rules? Well to say no would be anarchist talk, but at the same time I have attended a lot of rural fairs and sports days where I ate cold cut dinners, potato salad with eggs and salad dressing included, and I don't recall an upset stomach, and that was in years before most of the current rules regime existed.
I will grant that when I was a youngster, food might well have been safer in the sense the potatoes in the salad likely came from the family garden of the cook, and the eggs from their chicken coop. The control over the food we ate was much more in our hands.
We knew if a pig was sick, we never butchered that animal in the fall. We actually picked the animal out of the pen, shot it humanely and lifted it with a block and tackle and disposed of it ourselves.
It was the same with chickens.
And, most of the vegetables we ate came from the garden. They were canned, frozen or saved in cold storage for winter.
Much of the fruit was even gathered - blueberries, saskatoons and chokecherries in the wild, currants, raspberries, rhubarb, gooseberries and strawberries from the garden.
I grew up eating food I helped raise and put up for winter.
Now, I can tell you in my own case I haven't grown a thing to eat in more than a decade, and with the exception of the occasional farmers' market purchase from an area producer, I rely on food grown by others - often hundreds, if not thousands of miles away - processed by others, trucked by others, and handled by far too many others before I eat it.
So I am left to wonder if rules that impact barbecue events, cultural food sales at local events, potluck suppers are what are needed for safer food?
Or, do we need to take more personal responsibility for our own food, growing more of it, processing more of it, and cooking more of it?
