If there was any doubt that a full election campaign is underway it went away this week with a swing by the party that is hoping to generate another orange crush through first, Perth County, and then deep into the heartland of the Great Southwest.
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I'm usually not impressed with politicians jumping the gun and starting their campaigns months before election day, but let's face it: we've had a couple of spring and fall elections where planting and harvest negated the influence of the agricultural sector.
We know the election will be in October. We know where many farmers will be that month.
So much as county federations of agriculture are planning their regional meetings and soil and crop associations are working on their crop tours, let's hope some-one is planning ag-based candidates debates.
Wheat harvest is rolling in the southwest, and is soon to get going in other parts of Ontario, but after that there is a window of opportunity.
I don't typically endorse a party or a candidate, and I am not doing that now. But it was refreshing to see the first party leader to swing through the area visit farms in Perth County and Chatham-Kent.
I would argue there have been times the NDP hasn't had strong agricultural policy. So this latest foray into rural Canada adds a certain dynamic to agricultural politics that I for one, hadn't really expected.
Heads up, Mr. Trudeau and Mr. Harper. Mr. Mulcair just lobbed a warning shot across your bows. Pay attention to rural Canada.
I would not tell anyone how to vote, of course, and like many by the time late October rolls around I'll likely be sick and tired of political events, but lets face it, come October most of the listeners to this program will be more concerned about gravity bins and combines than listening to speeches and debates.
And if some of the contenders don't seem too interested, because the election isn't until October, perhaps that says more about them, than it does about rural Canada.
So the rural debates should start early. Let's hear the platforms debate the policy objectives and tell the parties what you want them to hear and do.
Rural Canada often feels left out of the political process.
Grab the issues and the politicians, and make this an election that counts.
