KEMPTVILLE — As of Nov. 1 there were four farmers, east of Toronto, running for the Ontario Federation of Agriculture executive.

Bette Jean Crews will be making her second bid for the vice presidency of the OFA at its annual meeting in Toronto November 21 to 23.

Crews grows apples and vegetables and runs a large roadside market near Wooler. She has a talent for linking political issues and getting disparate groups to work together.

She sees light at the end of the tunnel for farmers. "I sit with the United Voice and I see a different attitude," she says. She believes there will be both long-term and short term solutions to the income crisis and she can play a role.

Paul Mistele, from western Ontario, and Terry Otto, of Mecalfe, will also be running for the two-vice president positions. Otto has expertise in finances.

Geri Kamenz has declared he will run for a "leadership position" fueling speculation that he might be taking aim at the presidency. So far, only the current president Ron Bonnett has declared himself a candidate for the top position. A Spencerville mixed farmer, Kamenz has credentials both as a farm operator and as a farm politician. He has about 800 acres of cash crops, a cow-calf operation and beef feedlot and is multiplier for swine genetics. Among other things, he is chair of the Greenhouse Gas Mitigation committee.

Farm income is the key issue, he says, and believes leadership in the OFA is a full-time job. He thinks the grass roots must control OFA but the organization must be restructured because of the growing workload of those at the top.

Harry Brander, of Halton County, and Debbie Pretty-Straathof, of Renfrew County, will be running for the executive. A public Relations graduate, Pretty-Straathof runs a dairy farm and hit the road running when she decided to become involved with agricultural groups six years ago. She likes the Quebec style method of farm organization, but says the Quebec farmers operate too much like a union. "That would never go in Ontario," she says.