Who should own Saskatchewan farmland' | Globalnews.ca

Under the NDP, you had to reside in SK to own farmland.
The Saskatchewan party (conservative) opened ownership to anybody. This has been great for guys like my Dad looking to retire as foreigners have driven land prices up.

For guys like my brother starting out? It's brutal.

Long term, I think the NDP had a better approach. The way it is now, farming will eventually provide seasonal employment for large corporations and urbanisation will increase.

There will be no small towns left without farmers to support them.

If you own farmland you should be a resident and the land should be used for its intended purpose.

hate to ruin your fantasy, but small towns have been disappearing for the past 60 years across the prairies, regardless of what political party has been in power. Also, the Saskatchewan Party is not just the PC renamed, it is the result of the amalgamation of Saskatchewan Conservatives and Liberals who came together as an Anything But Dippers movement.

hate to ruin your fantasy, but small towns have been disappearing for the past 60 years across the prairies, regardless of what political party has been in power.
Not ruining any fantasies, I'm aware that urbanization is happening. The schools I attended no longer exist, for example. I stated this policy will speed it up. As will any policy that discourages smaller scale farms.


It's the conservative (small c) option in Saskatchewan.

hate to ruin your fantasy, but small towns have been disappearing for the past 60 years across the prairies, regardless of what political party has been in power. Also, the Saskatchewan Party is not just the PC renamed, it is the result of the amalgamation of Saskatchewan Conservatives and Liberals who came together as an Anything But Dippers movement.
Grant Devine killed the Conservatives in Saskatchewan. There is, still running about out there, a small core that would vote Conservative come hell or high water. If the Cons come back they will probably siphon off enough votes to boot Brad(who hasn't been too bad in government). It's a thought that keeps Walmart profitable resupplying the Sask Party Caucus with clean panties.
Also, there has been almost no Liberal support in Saskatchewan for years. Having your leader murder his wife really doesn't go well with the voters.

I looked up the school closures in Saskatchewan because I was puzzled not just at the number of closed schools in the villages around Burstall and Leader but why schools in places that small had even been built in the first place. Turns out it was Dipper policy behind both trends. Not accusing or anything but I don't know why any place that had maybe 50 houses total in it had to have a school built there when the slightly-bigger places were all of an extra half-hour away or so. The school closures were apparently just the Dips reversing course on a bad policy of theirs that had cost far too much and done too little.

they did the same thing with the roads....tried paving them all. The process wasn't maintained and now you have shitty highways with crumbling asphalt that are more dangerous than most washboard dirt roads.

Got that right. I figured the dirt roads saw a grader at least once a month or so which is why they were in fairly excellent condition but the paved ones looked like they were last maintained about the same time the Alaska Highway was built. Hit more than a few potholes on the paved segments near Weyburn that I was lucky not to have a wheel ripped off by.

#48 was scary as hell from the Sask border all the way to Kipling. #8 from Moosomin south to the US border was pretty horrible too.

The demise of small towns in Saskatchewan started when machinery came along to replace hands on tools and again when it got to the size and comfort that it is today. My cousin currently farms 10 times the amount of land my grandfather did and does it in comfort. At harvest his son helps a bit but has another job. Even 30+ years ago my cousins left Saskatchewan because there wasn't enough work for them on the farm. The big got bigger and the small sold out.

The same situation is all over the prairies. When my great grandfather and two other brothers arrived from England they bought 3 sections of land and were considered some of the biggest farmers in the district. He had seven sons, and four hired men. Today his great grandson farms those original three sections plus nine more, with two hired men that work seasonally.

For 15 years the land was owned by others after my grandfather sold it and moved to BC, but my mom's cousin came back from the UAE, after working on drilling platforms for 8 years and bought the original homestead and land and then began to buy more land. He 'retired' about 5 years ago and his son took over the land. Now , where there used to be about 10 families farming, there is just my cousin. All the old farms have been cleared, including the old school that served the area.

It's a similar situation with the maternal side of my mom's family. Land was divided up amongst those sons(my grand uncles) who wanted to farm, and eventually most of the kids drifted away into other occupations elsewhere. Almost all of the original 5 sections was bought by my mom's paternal cousin, after my Uncle Stan died childless.

People don't want to live in rural areas because of the perceived lack of amenities and services, medical being the biggest one. This is a trend that started in the 1960s and I doubt it'll be reversed, unless society begins to crumble....here's hoping.

"Perceived" is the key word. Lots of people from Guelph and Fergus choose to drive to the Mount Forest, Palmerston or Listowel Hospital, each 30 - 45 minutes away, because they know there's no wait times at those rural hospitals. You can walk right in and get seen as opposed to waiting 3 or 10 hours at Guelph General.

'Rural' Ontario is not really the same as 'rural' Manitoba/Saskatchewan/Alberta.

Exactly. I live in rural Ontario and I'm less than 30 minutes from Kingston, versus rural Prairies sometimes being 4-5 HOURS from anything.