Headline News

Attack on agriculture: Orangeville supports Green leader’s bill to preserve prime farmland

January 29, 2026   ·   0 Comments

By JAMES MATTHEWS

Ontario’s food security is threatened.

Mike Schreiner, leader of the Green Party of Ontario, said during Orangeville council’s Jan. 26 meeting that it is time for political and jurisdictional lines to be erased in the interest of defending food sovereignty and the province’s agri-food economy.

The province has as many as 49,000 farms that grow more than 200 different types of crops. Those farms contribute about $52 billion to the provincial economy and employ more than 875,000 people, he said.

One in nine jobs in Ontario is related to the agri-food sector.

“By far, the largest employer in the province of Ontario,” he said. “And all of that is currently under threat.”

That’s because the province loses 319 acres of farmland every day. That measures about one in nine family farms lost every week.

What makes that particularly concerning is that only five per cent of the province is arable. Less than one per cent of that is “prime farmland,” he said.

Schreiner inked his name to Bill 21, the Protect Our Food Act. It’s legislation broached last year that proposed establishing a foodbelt protection plan advisory committee to work toward protecting farmland by creating a foodbelt in Ontario.

“Without farmland, there are no farms, there is no food, there is no future,” he said. “And I would argue that food security is national security and we need to maintain that food security now more than ever.”

Orangeville’s council agreed to get behind the effort and support the goals of Bill 21.

Councillor Joe Andrews asked about any involvement by the Dufferin Federation of Agriculture (DFA).

Schreiner said the DFA has endorsed the proposed legislation through the Ontario Federation of Agriculture. All such groups have back Bill 21 by supporting the industry’s provincial body.

Coun. Tess Prendergast said half of Dufferin County’s land mass is farmland.

“So we’re very much part of that agri-business here in Orangeville,” she said. “Supporting Bill 21 is really about ensuring communities like ours benefit for generations to come because we all eat.”

Readers Comments (0)