ROBERTS: Survey wants farmers’s input on the issue

instead, it believes there are new technologies available, as well as existing on-farm practices in place, that can get the job done.

It’s opened a survey to hear from farmers with their ideas about how to help cut back emissions.

This is a positive step forward. I can’t help feeling a little optimistic about this grassroots approach. In the past,

Ottawa has held round table discussions and summits to get farmer input on some matters. Often, that input was channelled through farm group representatives. Now, it could hardly be wider.

I expect to see ideas that fully funded, others that are cost-shared and still some that are maybe free, obtainable with just a management change. In any event, the suggestions are bound to be practical, economical and imaginative…much like farmers themselves.

This effort should ultimately give Ottawa confidence moving forward – provided, of course, it accepts some of the ideas it’s seeking, and acknowledges them.

If it does, this could be the start of an improved approach to climate change for the federal government and for farmers.