Rural Saskatchewan Sustainability

Introduction

Rural Saskatchewan is considered the geographical area outside of the sixteen cities in the province suggests the most appropriate rural definition is “the population .  Statistics Canadaliving in towns and municipalities outside the commuting zone of larger urban centers (outside the commuting zone of centers with population of 10,000 or more).” Rural Saskatchewan sits in the heart of the prairies and encompasses the outdoors, agriculture, and other scenic delights. Rural communities face diverse and unprecedented challenges that affect rural sustainability and threaten long-term decline.

Sustainability is the capacity to endure while maintaining social, environmental, and economical activity. Rural communities and farms are struggling to maintain their presence in Saskatchewan as the number of farms has decreased 16.6% since 2006, resulting in 16.4% less farm operators. Changes in the education levels of farm women, coupled with high land values, environmental changes and resource management have threatened community vitality. A shift from the family farm to large corporation farms has been increasing, altering the state of the rural area.  This has introduced a variety of problems, as rural Saskatchewan provides a strong cultural experience and economic benefits to those living there, to those who have been farming for generations, and to those who will continue to farm in the future.

Educated Women

The role of women in rural sustainability can be crucial to the community. Historically, women have been the backbone of rural communities; the days when women would stay home and care for children are disappearing. As the primary decision makers of the household, women hold the power to determine the amount of participation, if any, the household contributes to the community. Farm women play multiple roles and are key to maintaining families, family farms, and rural communities.

Currently, more women are leaving their hometown communities for education in urban centers. The Status of Women Office shows in that 39% of rural Saskatchewan women continued with higher education including degrees, diplomas, certificates, and trade diploma or certificates in 2006. They are motivated to find good paying jobs after convocation, with many of those jobs in urban centers, as shown in the graph below. As women bear more responsibility of economic transformations, they are less likely to go back to rural Saskatchewan where income earnings and modern conveniences are fewer.

The above graph shows average individual incomes for Saskatchewan women. Rural and smaller urban located women earned $20, 700 as compared to the $28, 800 income earned by women working in the bigger center of Regina.

The real problem lies in balancing the culture and traditions of rural Saskatchewan with the search for higher paying jobs.  Double-income opportunities allow families to experience a higher quality life. Understandably, men are likely to follow the women into the cities, leaving family farms and history behind. Educated women are struggling to evolve with the economy while simultaneously maintaining the culture and tradition of rural Saskatchewan.

For more information on Rural women income earnings, education, and location statistics:

http://www.socialservices.gov.sk.ca/income.pdf

Land Values

The primary industry of rural Saskatchewan is farming. Agriculture simultaneously offers immense opportunities while facing immediate challenges. One of these challenges is land values. No longer is farming the humble, modest lifestyle. It has turned into a large corporation business with farm receipts continuing to rise. The evolution of farming forces farmers to keep up with the changes or find themselves out of the business.

Current land values have at least doubled in all areas. According to the Saskatchewan Government, Saskatchewan property values have increased by 67% in the last four years. Not long ago, $1000 an acre made it hard for a farmer to pay up. These days, upwards of $2000 an acre are standard prices for farmers looking into farm expansion.

Other industries such as oil and potash have contributed to supporting the high land values where in the past the market may have dropped. The development of these industries has also peaked foreign interest. Many sophisticated investment companies understand the high value of land. With an expected nine billion people to feed by 2050, these companies are purchasing farm land at higher values than the local farmer can compete with.

Farmers in Saskatchewan can now be faced with a hard economic decision: Is buying land financially feasible for them? Purchasing such high valued land will have to take a toll somewhere, such as in family and respective local traditions. It can, also, provide the incentive for family run operations to sell their land and take advantage of these high prices. This promotes the problem of the big farms getting bigger, as they are the only ones who can afford the land.

Foreign land investment companies also create opportunities for immigrants to be involved with agriculture and farming operations. This provides an interesting test that may conflict with the rural Saskatchewan agriculture traditions.

Environment and Resource Management

With 16 cities, more than 150 towns, 280 villages and hamlets and almost 300 rural municipalities, the Saskatchewan government has many places to allocate money. The issue with this is the economic viability to manage resources that provide returns to the government.

Pouring billions of dollars into rural Saskatchewan will not generate a solid return. The current infrastructure of Saskatchewan has thousands of miles of highways connecting rural towns costing billions of dollars annually to maintain. Centralizing amenities would save the government billions of dollars to allocate elsewhere.

However, the environmental effects of abandoning rural Saskatchewan has large consequences. As dying towns are slowly destroyed, the bi-products of this would have large impact on the ecology of the province.The reduction of family farms potentially could result in thousands of people without jobs. As a province that is dominantly rural centered, forcing people out of jobs and the resulting family relocation is a large opportunity cost the government would need to take into consideration.

Conclusion

With these problems becoming more and more evident and threatening to the survival of rural Saskatchewan, several methods or solutions should be taken into consideration to help sustain the rural areas.

With the increasing opportunities for women in urban areas, slowing the number of women from leaving the farm is a challenge. However, governments and/or educational institutions may consider offering rural women seeking education a tuition break, based on the guarantee they would return to the farm. After five years and proof that the student has agricultural profit producing assets, they would receive a portion of that tuition back. The government could also increase funding in rural towns and areas to provide amenities that would prevent the need to go to the big cities. These could include grocery stores and small clothing stores. A lure of higher paying jobs is another reason why less and less women are going back to the farm. By creating high paying jobs that are able to be done from home, women will have yet another reason to stay in rural areas without the loss of income.

Land values seem to be one of the biggest issues in encouraging farmers to keep their land. By introducing government grants to family run farms, encouraging technological growth and agricultural education, families would be able to afford to keep their land as well as incorporate new technologies that would perhaps not be practical to purchase due to money constraints. Governments have imposed restrictions on land purchasing with laws such as Canadian citizenship but it is not closely monitored. Price ceilings would also be a way to help keep land more reasonably priced. This would help ensure that family run farms are able to keep their farms and will not be tempted to sell because of high prices. It will also make it more affordable for young farmers to buy land.

Environment and resource management are both things that are difficult to solve, however; some measures can be taken in small steps. Several of these steps would be tax breaks for those being "environmentally friendly" living in rural areas. Or, rather than putting billions of dollars into roads, that money could go towards working on keeping small town schools open and employed with quality teachers which will lead to more jobs and will attract outsiders to the rural areas.

By taking these solutions into consideration more people will be attracted to returning to rural Saskatchewan. By encouraging women to return to the farm, changing land values so they are more affordable and managing the environment as well as resources, sustaining rural areas in the beautiful province of Saskatchewan will be achievable and will remain for future generations to see.

References

Saskatchewan Ministry of Advanced Education, Employment and Labor. "Socio-Demographic Profiles of Saskatchewan Women: Income for Women". Accessed February 10, 2013.http://www.socialservices.gov.sk.ca/income.pdf

Saskatchewan Ministry of Advanced Education, Employment and Labor. "Socio-Demographic Profiles of Saskatchewan Women: Rural Women". Accessed February 10, 2013. http://www.socialservices.gov.sk.ca/rural-women.pdf

Saskatchewan Municipalities. "Rural growth strategies". Accessed February 9, 2013.  http://www.growourregion.ca/html/strategies/rural/index.cfm

Statistics Canada. "Saskatchewan Provincial Trends". Accessed February 10, 2013. http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/95-640-x/2012002/prov/47-eng.htm

Stock Photo Pro. "Images for Saskatchewan." Accessed February 10, 2013.   http://www.stockphotopro.com/photo-thumbs-2/AK9TAR.jpg

Times Colonist. "Saskatchewan property values soar 67% over 4 years". Accessed February 10, 2013. http://digital.timescolonist.com/epaper/viewer.aspx

Western Producer. "Saskatchewan land prices likely to stay strong". Access February 9, 2013. http://www.producer.com/2012/02/saskatchewan-land-prices-likely-to-stay-strong/