Much of the activity relating to the support of agricultural prices in Canada is conducted under the authority of the Wheat Board Act and the Agricultural Prices Support Act, but the programme in its broadest sense involves other legislation and a variety of government policies. Part of this programme originated in the inter-war period and earlier years. This paper, dealing with various aspects of the programme, is introduced by a brief outline of background developments.

Governments, both federal and provincial, have traditionally been concerned in the main with activities aimed at increasing efficiency in the production and marketing of farm products. These have included experimental and scientific research; efforts to improve the quality of plants and animals; the introduction and enforcement of grades and standards for marketing; and extension work designed to acquaint farmers with useful information as it became available.

During the First World War this pattern of activity was enlarged. At that time the federal Government took over control of the marketing of wheat. It gave to a body known as the Board of Grain Supervisors authority to fix the prices and to market the crops of 1917 and 1918. This proved to be the forerunner of a development that has since come to occupy an important place in government activity.