In 1962, the Health of Animals Division split from the Production and Marketing Branch. Hamilton also established the Food Research Institute, combining three related institutes into one to study food quality and consumer acceptance, storage and processing. At the height of the Cold War, Hamilton sold Canada s surplus grain to communist China. Beijing had a food shortage and started buying Canadian wheat in 1958. The trade and diplomatic negotiations were controversial.
Cabinet almost didn t approve the credit arrangements.
Americans opposed trading with enemy communists . Commonwealth loyalists opposed China s aggression towards India. And textile manufacturers feared lost market share if reciprocal Chinese goods entered Canada. However, these sales restored western agricultural prosperity the average farm income tripled and created a lasting legacy for the Conservative party across the Prairies. Hamilton helped establish the United Nations World Food Program and the Agricultural Economic Research Council, a joint industry-government agency dedicated to independent policy evaluation and research in agricultural economics and rural sociology.