From the Editor…
Some months back I read an interesting editorial comment in one of the daily provincial papers.
This editorial essay commented upon what a big fat waste of money it is to have so many services provided all over the province in our “crazy patchwork of rural communities”.
The author of this piece went on to declare how much more efficient and economically viable New Brunswick would be if half the population didn’t live in rural communities.
This got my back up because this article clearly supports the NB Corporate Wet Dream of centralizing all services and health care in a few big mega-centres.
Those of us who live in the River Valley have been watching this plot unfold for years now as hospitals are downsized or closed and other social services are re-located.
And we are really seeing this mind-set in the callous government disregard for the Village of Perth-Andover in the aftermath of the devastating flood of 2012….a flood that could have been prevented.
Now there have been a couple of recent new headlines that further caught my attention. A professional pollster has been consulted and has officially pronounced that the “NB Economy is a Basket Case.”
I guess if some feller says he’s the expert then what he says must be true!
Don Mills is the chairman and CEO of Corporate Research Associates, a polling firm based in Halifax.
He does make some valid points. NB is way too dependent on public sector jobs. And rural regions have many seasonal jobs, so that folks need to draw EI when not working.
However, I must take exception to his recommendations. He further states that we small town New Brunswickers are way too rural for our own good and that we are all infected with a sense of entitlement….people here just to seem to feel that they should be allowed to live anywhere they want!
People, he says, need to get with the program and move to where the jobs are. We need, in short, to become urban dwellers.
It sounds like he’s suggesting that we country bumpkin types should all pack our bags and move to the city ASAP!
Otherwise, we’re all just a pack of selfish gits who expect more than our fair share of goodies.
But even if people do take this advice, who the heck will buy the home or farm that is left behind?
There’s a fairly famous little book that was published a few years back titled “Hey, Who Moved My Cheese?”
It became kind of the darling du jour for corporate honcho types who were laying off employees by the thousands as they outsourced their production to China or whichever country was providing the cheapest slave labour at the time.
The book used rats and cheese to explain some facts of life to us humans who might be struggling to make ends meet or had lost jobs. When the cheese gets moved, rats are intelligent enough to follow the cheese. Rats don’t sit around whining because their cheese isn’t where it used to be anymore!
So, using this analogy, us rural folks need to follow the cheese and move to the cities where the jobs are. But what kind of jobs, exactly? Shall we all work at McDonalds? Tim Hortons? I mean, I do realize that there’s a Tims on pretty much every block in Moncton, but who will be the customers if everyone is dishing out Timbits and Double Doubles?
What New Brunswick really needs is more production. To revitalize our province, we need to produce consumable goods, not provide more services.
Nearly all of New Brunswick’s original prosperity came from agriculture. We may not all want to work on farms, but I cannot over-state what a boon full scale hemp production would be for this province.
Hemp production on a large scale would provide jobs in virtually every sector: Food, pulp, fibre, medicines, clothing, plastics, building materials, retail….Hemp is truly a resource with thousands of uses!
The government of NB is not going to do anything to promote hemp agriculture….it is up to us, the citizens, to get involved and get active.
Hemp farming will help preserve our communities and restore rural prosperity!
Stephanie Kelley
