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| Pristine farmland; pasture in the foreground with cropland in the background. A disappearing commodity in the Calgary region. |
Whether or not this is true will remain to be seen, but it is most certainly looking that way for my family. Over the years, my family has experienced everything from people dumping garbage along our roadways to finding a chop shop to finding calves choking on plastic garbage bags that people have littered. Massive commercial and industrial developments have taken place in the region and these developments have greatly increased traffic in the Balzac area (where my family farms). To me, the most painful part of these changes is not the increased traffic in the area or the large scale of the projects. I realize that progress will happen one way or another. The most painful part is that land is allowed to be stripped and rendered useless to farmers before it is even purchased for industrial usage. The land then sits exposed without topsoil until it is fully developed. Since it is lacking its topsoil, noxious weeds grow in the exposed clay that is unsuitable for grass to grow in. These weeds then spread easily into crops, which farmers are then forced to spray with herbicides in order to maintain quality crops and a sufficient income. The stripped land can sit like this for years before it is purchased by a developer. This is exactly what happened with the construction of the CrossIron Mills mega-mall (the mall also had many other logistical problems due to its location which hindered its construction).
This spring, my family will see 120 acres of farmland we have rented for decades be stripped and become useless (one acre is equivalent to about the size of four city lots). We will also lose about 30 acres of pastureland to this process. It is sad but true that with the advance of the city into the Balzac region, pasture rental increases and therefore so does the cost of keeping cattle in the area. As I said earlier, I am not against progress, but one must ask the question; is it really progress that the world is experiencing a food crisis and we are allowing productive farmland to become useless?
That bites majorly. I wish I had more constructive things to say about this issue, but as a city boy, I don't have much knowledge or experience with agriculture.
ReplyDeleteIt truly is screwed up that this farmland is being used in such a grossly inefficient and counterproductive way. I guess progress comes at a price.
Well said Amber. This question of progress is one that really needs to be addressed before it's too late and the prairies become short of usable farmland and pasture land. You should send this in to the Rocky View Weekly or the Airdrie Echo (even a Calgary paper for that matter), as I don't think people realize exactly what development in the Balzac area, or really any rural area entails. Who knows, if people were more aware then maybe there might be some positive change, even if it's just allowing the land to be farmed for a bit longer until the developers are ready to actually begin to develop the land.
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