Sept. 25 is Franco-Ontarian Day in our province. It’s a celebration of the cultural, historical, social, economic and political contributions of francophones in Ontario.
At the Ontario Federation of Agriculture (OFA), nearly 600 of our members report French as their primary language and of our 15 regions across Ontario, nine are home to at least five or more French-speaking members.
I am proud to count myself among this group — born and raised French in the bilingual community of Lafontaine, just west of Penetanguishene, where our son Alex grows crops and produces chicken as the fifth generation of our family on our farm. Since 2021, I’ve also served on the provincial board of the OFA as the director representing farmers in Peel, Simcoe and York.
I’m also proud of the work that OFA does to provide communications to francophone members in their native language and to work together wherever possible with our French-speaking colleagues at the Union des cultivateurs franco-ontariens (UCFO).
In 2021, with the support of funding from the provincial government, we collaborated on a project with UCFO to translate many of our fact sheets, policy documents, and other important resources into French and make them available on the OFA website.
Since then, we’ve carried forward a commitment to ensuring key news releases, opinion columns like this Viewpoint and other communications on key and province-wide topics are translated and made available in French.
We also make sure all of our OFA election information is provided in both official languages so that the democratic process of our organization is transparent and accessible to our members.
And for the past year, OFA has been working closely with our counterparts at UCFO to promote a program they’re leading in Ontario called AgriMentor that provides one-on-one mentorship coaching nationwide in French or English for women working in agriculture.
I’m one of three French-speaking directors on the OFA board and we also have staff who can support our members and respond to inquiries in French, ensuring timely flow of information.
It was former OFA director Réjean Pommainville from Limoges, who passed away in 2021, who really championed OFA’s efforts in this space and encouraged us to take a more active role in it.
He represented farmers from Prescott, Russell, Stormont and Glengarry on our provincial board from 2012 to 2021 and he was a lifelong volunteer in our industry and in his community.
He was particularly well known for being a strong and proud advocate for French and Francophone heritage in Ontario and he and his wife Barbara were named winners of the 2020 Prix d’Excellence en Agriculture Pierre-Bercier, awarded by the UCFO for work promoting the agriculture sector and providing leadership in the Franco-Ontarian agricultural community.
He believed in the importance of French language communications and his legacy lives on in our organization. As a fellow Franco-Ontarian, it’s also important to me that we make this effort for our members.
I understand the strong ties of language and culture and how important it is to keep that heritage and tradition alive, and I’m proud that OFA is committed to supporting our efforts to do so.
Paul Maurice is a director with the Ontario Federation of Agriculture.
