Sam Oosterhoff, Minister of Agriculture, Food and Agribusiness
Nelson Zandbergen
Farmers Forum
QUEEN’S PARK — Raised a farm kid, Southwestern Ontario MPP Sam Oosterhoff was officially sworn in as Ontario’s Minister of Agriculture, Food and Agribusiness (OMAFA) last month.
Premier Doug Ford promoted the 29-year-old Oosterhof (PC – Niagara West) into cabinet’s senior ranks in the Sept. 10 shuffle. Oosterhoff, first elected to Queen’s Park at age 19 — the youngest MPP on record — has held a cabinet seat since 2024 when he was appointed to a junior position as ‘associate minister’ of energy-intensive industries.
In his new role as OMAFA minister, he replaced Trevor Jones, now the Minister of Labour.
Oosterhoff inherits the agriculture portfolio during a pivotal time marked by trade uncertainties and shifting supply chain dynamics. He now oversees a nearly $50 billion agri-food economic sector supporting well over 800,000 jobs, according to government statistics.
He was born and raised in Vineland where his parents operated a hog farm, now a poultry operation. Oosterhoff is the second Ontario agriculture minister to emerge from the post-World War II Dutch immigration wave that reshaped the province’s farming landscape — following in the footsteps of MPP Ernie Hardeman (PC – Oxford). Both sets of Oosterhoff’s grandparents were farmers who left the Netherlands for Canada in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Reflecting on the legacy of his Dutch roots, he observed that Holland managed to turn itself into an “agrifood superpower” on the export market, exclaiming, “We want to do that here.”
A married father of two young children, Oosterhoff is known for his socially conservative views and devout Christian beliefs that have occasionally made him a lightning rod for the progressive left. During the height of the woke mania that gripped Canada in 2018, a 20-year-old Oosterhoff earned social media ire for singing a few bars of a popular African-American spiritual hymn on a TV Ontario political program. It was an authentic moment, and host Steve Paikin praised the young man’s voice. But some folks online just couldn’t see past Oosterhoff’s skin colour.
Premier Ford stuck by his youngest MPP, who also survived the tumult of the Covid-19 pandemic years. Oosterhoff took flak for posing unmasked in an October 2020 group photo and later apologized.
What follows is a telephone interview with Oosterhoff on Oct. 1.
Farmers Forum: What is your priority for the remainder of this year?
Oosterhoff: “My priorities are the priorities the premier has established for our government as a whole and for agriculture specifically. We want to build out a more sovereign, secure and self-reliant agrifood sector from … the production to the processing, cutting red tape where we need to make it easier to do business here in the province, especially for our farmers and for our ag producers. And also cutting costs, because the reduction in the gas tax, for example, that we’ve done, and other measures to try to help farmers and keep costs down where possible. And then also really make sure that we’re diversifying our trade relationships, export opportunities so that we’re not so reliant on two-way trade just with the United States, but that we’re able to enhance those markets more broadly.”
Farmers Forum: What is your long-term priority for Ontario agriculture?
Oosterhoff: “Moving quicker, faster, when it comes to delivering on those priorities. But really, I’m going to be also focused on getting out to meet folks and hear from them directly about their concerns, their priorities and what they see in the way of opportunities. I will say in the next couple of months, a couple of key areas are we’re going to emphasize is the work on the Farmland Security Act, making sure that we are protecting Ontario farmland, Canadian farmland from … foreign buyers who might want to come in and snap up that land … You’ll see me do work also on market expansion through the market diversification and trade resiliency initiative, which is going to support more domestic processing of products here in Ontario and make sure … we’re actually growing and then using those funds to secure more jobs throughout that supply chain.
“Lastly, I would say you’re going to see yet more emphasis on streamlining access to the Great Clay Belt, and the massive amount of opportunities that exist in Northern Ontario on Crown land right now.”
Farmers Forum: What is the biggest challenge facing Ontario farmers today?
Oosterhoff: “There’s probably two main ones: One is the cost of diesel and fertilizer and inputs more broadly have really escalated as a result of the Iranian conflict, the Middle East conflict. And then also, of course, the trade challenges that we’re seeing with the United States and the importance that that market remains as a massive purchaser of Canadian agricultural products and processed products. I think the folks in the the dairy goat industry, I think the folks in the cut flower industry, I think of the mushroom growers, I think of these kinds of sectors that are perhaps smaller than some of the very large traditional agricultural groups, but still have an important role to play in our domestic agricultural industries and frankly support thousands of jobs. They need our support and you’ll see me working to make sure that they’re supported.”
Farmers Forum: Have you decided if you will accept the dairy goat producers’ vote and proceed with certifying the new dairy goat marketing board?
Oosterhoff: “I’ve heard from folks already from the industry, and I’m going to talk to them about what needs to happen there. And I understand the desire for professionalization, the desire for there to be a strong provincial voice. We have 22 commodity groups here in the province already who have marketing boards. I grew up on a pork farm, and the pork producers were certified … back in 1946. So we have a long legacy and history of these marketing boards. But I have said already, you know, I’m only a couple of weeks into the job, I want to make sure that I’m dotting my eyes and crossing my t’s and sit down with folks before making a final decision, right?”
