The Provincial Policy Statement Review
Posted: December 7, 2012
Categories: Food in the News / GoodFoodBites / News from Sustain Ontario / Ontario Food Policy / Policy News
Courtesy of Greenfuse Photos
The Importance of the Provincial Policy Statement: Getting Dirty in the Details
by Carolyn Young and Luyi Yang
A year ago, I didn’t know what the Provincial Policy Statement (PPS) was. Provincial Policy Statement sounds vaguely important, right? But what is it? If you’re not a planner, you’ve probably never heard of it. But the PPS is extremely important. It is a piece of legislation that is part of the Planning Act, the regulation regime that covers all land use in the province of Ontario. Basically, the PPS sets the minimum bar for how municipalities and regions govern their land use. Each municipality and region sets out their own official plan based on their particular context and priorities, but what they can or can’t do is set by the PPS.
The PPS gets reviewed every 5 years and the latest review process began in 2010. The PPS review involves extensive community consultation and stakeholder input, to the extent that the review process is still on-going, 2 years later. The final draft of the PPS has recently been published through the Environmental Bill of Rights, a registry where all legislation that may have environmental impacts goes for public input before being amended. The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing (MMAH) also held workshops for the public to better understand and give input on the final draft of the document.
I attended the Toronto workshop on the night of the US elections and learned a lot. I also had the opportunity to give valuable input, one-on-one with a Senior Policy Advisory working on the PPS.
The question that I’m sure all of you Sustain Ontario Members want answered is this, what has changed in this version of the PPS that is important to food and farming?
1. They’ve changed what used to be called “secondary uses” to “on-farm diversified uses” which they’ve defined as “small-scale uses that are secondary to the principle use of the property and help support the farm. On-farm diversified uses include, but are not limited to, home occupations, home industries, agri-tourism uses, and uses that produce value-added agriculture products from the farm operation.”
This is a great move forward in allowing on-farm processing, but how effective it will be remains to be seen. Without more specific guidelines on how this will play out on a local level, it may hold little weight.
2. They’ve included some exciting new language about building strong and “healthy” communities, promoting land use that “maintains biodiversity and resilience to climate change”, “encouraging consultation with Aboriginal communities”, and “providing opportunities to support local food” as a way to support long-term economic property. Alone, these changes may not have much weight in policy, but it’s great to see that throughout the document, the new language creates a more environmentally and socially conscious tone.
3. They’ve changed a few things in some significant areas: a)settlement, b) agriculture and c)rural areas
They now recognize the significant variety in size, density and diversity of settlement areas, and the importance of the vitality of these areas to long-term economic prosperity. The most important addition to the settlement section is the support for active transportation and efficient movement of goods. Further, whether an area is supportive of transit is a new criterion of land use within settlement areas.
For the agriculture sector, the PPS states that there shall be more protection for prime agricultural areas and specialty crop areas. But there are still a lot left to be improved upon – for example, a clear procedure for designating specialty crop areas is lacking, and better guidelines are needed. Additional directions are also needed to address the inconsistency of the scale of activities allowed on prime agricultural areas.
The same applies to the section on rural areas. There is an exciting recognition of the significance of rural areas to the economy and our daily lives, but terms need to go into much more detail.
4. One piece that many groups in the food and farming sector are disappointed by is the continuing prioritization of mining and aggregate extraction over agricultural land use. The new PPS continues to support aggregate extraction in agricultural areas – even those which are otherwise protected like the Greenbelt.
Ontario has a large portion of Canada’s best-quality soil, making farmland one of the province’s key assets. However, aggregate extraction below the water table renders farmland beyond the point of rehabilitation; it is impossible to restore the soil that would allow the same farming activities to continue post-extraction. Unfortunately aggregate is encouraged to proceed as long as the mining company promises to restore land back to “farming condition” at some point in the future. This is the most significant disappointment in the updated PPS.
Looking towards the future, it is likely that there will be some changes to the PPS review process in future years. The process is notoriously long and time intensive. I have heard suggestions that the review become an on-going process or that it take place even less frequently. Regardless of how it changes, the PPS review process it will certainly remain important for food and farming stakeholders.
To learn more about the PPS review and recommendations for changes from the food and farming sector, check out these submissions from Sustain Ontario staff and from other Ontario food and farming groups.
Greater Toronto Area Agricultural Action Committee PPS Submission
National Farmers Union PPS Submission
The North Dufferin Agricultural and Community Task Force PPS Submission
Ontario Farmland Trust PPS Submission
Waterloo Food System Round Table PPS Submission