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Copyright © 2001 Eastern Ontario Farmers Forum Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Give
the boy a break
Seeking incentives to
encourage new farmers
OTTAWA
— How would your son or daughter like to be given free tuition to go to
college if he or she returns to the farm?
Of course you’d love it. Winchester dairy farmer Dennis St. Pierre, in an Ottawa
presentation to the Canadian Farm Business Management Council on
succession planning, says he will encourage governments to follow the
innovative lead of some U.S. states to help new young farmers. Tuition
forgiveness, introduced in Pennsylvania, is just one idea he will present.
Here are others: • Nebraska offers low interest rates
to beginner farmers and tax breaks to retiring farmers who help a young
farmer get started.
• How about a beginner farmer tax credit? Or a program whereby a retiring farmer gets tax breaks if he, for a period of, say three years, rents or leases land, facilities, storage, machinery or animals to a beginner farmer.
• Non-taxed capital gains whereby a retiring farmer who sells to a beginner farmer will not be taxed on his earnings from the sale of the farm. This allows a farmer to sell to a beginner farmer at a lower price.
According to the OMAF office in Kemptville, there are no incentive programs in the province for beginner farmers.
"Quebec is one of the best provinces for incentive programs," said St. Pierre. "For the first time the (Ontario agricultural) ministry is realizing there is a problem. There is a movement afoot to look at all the different programs."
In Quebec, the Establishment Grant has been set up offering up to $30,000 to new farmers between ages 18 and 40.