It is the best of times.  It is the worst of times.  Last week Statistics Canada released some new economic numbers.  They said Canadian employers added 50,500 workers in March, compared with 24,700 in the previous month.  The white-hot Canadian economy has a jobless rate of 6.3%.  It hasn’t been that low in over 30 years.

Its like in the non-farm economy we’re seeing the good times roll.  However, last week I stood before 7000 people on Parliament Hill in Ottawa at the National Solidarity Farm Rally.  With the farm economy in a tailspin farm leaders were looking for a change in agricultural policy.

For farmers it’s a double whammy, of low commodity prices, a high Canadian dollar and a dearth in agricultural policy.  The previous Liberal government had slashed agricultural stabilization policy.  It didn’t matter when times were good.  But now Canadian agriculture is caught short.  That’s why all those rural people were in Ottawa last week.

I did what I did.  In the heated atmosphere on stage I tried to keep abreast of whom I was introducing and my own notes.  I’ve become used to in the winter and spring of 2006 of revving up a crowd.  So when it reached a crescendo at the end, I was hoping for better times.  Our farm economy needs to join the rest of the greater Canadian economy.  Or we should all move to Alberta.

That was brought home to me later that day.  After things had settled down, a group of the organizers and myself went to a restaurant and watering hole on Sparks street.  It was there where I met up with some Alberta farmers who had participated in the rally.

Sitting there I was intrigued.  Are these really the guys from the land of milk and honey?  What are these guys doing trying to grow canola and beef when they could work in the oil patch?  We asked them to join us and soon my questions caught radar.

How do you guys ever get anybody to work on a farm out there was my first question.  They recoiled and said it’s pretty hard.  You get $15/hour for selling donuts at Tim Horton’s.  You get $2400/day for driving truck on the ice roads of northern Alberta.  Jobs are everywhere!  They even had a hard time trying to explain what they were doing on the farm.

Think about it, $15/hour for selling donuts.  Who would want to bale hay?  Nobody of course, the men’s saying it’s unbelievably difficult to get anybody to work in agriculture.

All of this raised the ugly spectre of rising inflation.  It only stands to reason with so much money in a place like Alberta, invariably prices will rise.  No, Ontario isn’t Alberta.  No Chatham-Kent is nothing like Alberta.  However, the Bank of Canada is set to keep interest rates rising.  It’s there biggest stick in their fight against rising prices.  The unfortunate part is parts of Canada, which are highly dependent on agriculture like Chatham-Kent doesn’t need interest rates to rise.  The net effect here will be highly negative.

There is some speculation that the Bank of Canada will raise interest rate three times before the end of the year.  I find that a bit hard to believe, but with Alberta being what it is, maybe it’ll happen.  Consumer debt in this country is very high.  In other words the world of cheap money over the last several years has been a “no money down” paradise.  Canadians like there American counterparts have spent crazy.

It’ll mean after three interest rate hikes; Canadian disposable income (at least outside Alberta) will go down.  That will cool any inflation and yes, it’ll force the dollar up.  The manufacturing and agricultural sector in Ontario will just have to get used to it.

That isn’t the most optimistic of assessments for southwestern Ontario and Chatham-Kent.  Yes, there may be a new agricultural stabilization policy to help local agriculture, but as of now it’s still a theory.  Our manufacturing sector has expanded recently Vis a Vis the Navistar hires, but how will it fair with a 90-cent dollar fueled by higher interest rates?

Clearly some political leadership at the local level will be very important.  How can we diversify the local economy to shield against higher interest rate and a higher dollar?  Did somebody say get a University here in Chatham-Kent?  How about starting a high tech software research park?  Thinking out of the box might be our path to the future.  With our Canadian economic centre of gravity clearly moving out west, the rest of us will have to find a way to adjust.