Cull cow subsidy?

[grassfarmer]

Just reading my cattlemen magazine and wondering what is really going on with the cull cows and the request for a(nother) packer subsidy.
I see from Wildeman's column that CCA are spearheading the appeal for a packer subsidy of $31.70 per head. Seems CCA are worried we will lose our OTM kill capacity but "providing payment to the packers will provide incentive for them to bid higher to keep the cattle in Canada" he continues with the usual trickle down logic "Cattle producers will then benefit from both the payment and by sustaining slaughter capacity in Canada" I know it's the season of HoHoHo but really... Government pays the packers $24 million a year so they can bid higher, keep the cattle in Canada and pass the extra money onto the producers. Are these guys for real??
I guess I'd be wasting my time sending the appeal for a packer/retailer profitability inquiry to CCA then?

[per]

You should anyway GF. They will be held accountable for their inactions some day.

[smcgrath76]

GF, the other way to accomplish the same
thing is that they could pay the subsidy
directly to ranchers, and then the
further ups in the chain could actually
bid the subsidy out of the price. There
were several programs like this with my
favourite being the "set aside" program.
This is a more palatable approach, since
they can then issue a press announcement
about how they are directly infusing
cash into family farms (rather than big
packers).
Do I smell Christmas sarcasm cooking???

[jensend]

there isn't a farm subsidy in canada that doesn't end up in pockets other than the producers' because the markets aren't working. if there was real competition the payment could be made to the producer and slaughter plants would have to do their share to make the market.

[greybeard]

his would be a good deal if a producer group could take over XL beef in Moose Jaw.
This is a paste from the original news release when the NDP unloaded the plant onto NB. The main plant was built in 1990 with a boxed beef line added in 96.
XL Foods has purchased the Moose Jaw company for $1.868 million. It will also

assume certain liabilities of between $6 million and $7 million. CIC will

provide XL with financing in the form of a $2.368 million secured loan to be

repaid over 10 years.
They have capacity for 180,000 hd a yr. That can return near 6 million if you only killed OTM.
Maybe Brian would give you 10 years to repay. He seems to have no use for it at this time. As Sean says, it's Christmas!

[charliep]

these questions will have to be answered in the CWB annual report.

I will look for answers to the following?

How big (tonnes) was the actual size of the "B" Pool?

Accounting for all sources of income into the "B" pool including interest earning. Similar comments on the pooling expense side. Someone will have to explain the allocation of revenue between the A and B pool over time.

CWB barley cash sales or the not talked about feed barley cash plus. should be clarification of this in the CWB annual report and how profits (or perhaps losses) are handled.

The answer to my question is open market for feed barley but I have to ask why the CWB doesn't go directly to cash pricing feed barley with a deduction for CWB costs (visible and accounted for).

The highlight of your note is none of the market signals from the export market are fed into the domestic market. If the CWB is cash trading with feed barley sourced from the open market and the benefits from this deposited from these sales in the pricing pools, then farmers need to ask questions. The impact of this this last statement is lower prices in the domestic feed market which represents 80 % of barley consumption.

[TOM4CWB]

Thanks Charlie,

If there ever was a time that the CWB completely messes up market signals... and is doing nothing to help any grain farmer... but distorting the feed market lower in western Canada... IT IS NOW... once again.

What on earth is the CWB marketing feed grains for... when they themselves admit there is virtually no market power or near enough volume to obtain a possible premium with such a CWB small minuscule % of the global trade in feed grains.

[charliep]

What will be interesting in the extra money from the $168/tonne in the Sept. PRO (was $163/tonne) is whether the money is real can be demonstrated in sales revenue or an accounting exercise coming from transfer of revenue, allocation of expenses, valuation of inventory, etc. Perhaps the most important thing is to have CWB feed barley payments/prices be an actual reflection of sales activity.

Perhaps one of the stupidist things the CWB does is the bureaucratic allocation of funds (revenue and expenses) at the end of a year based on 50 year concept of fairness versus moving feed barley straight to commercially based cash plus type program or better cash pricing in line with the guaranteed delivery contracts and a $5/tonne or whatever charge with the excess/deficit handled by the contingency fund.

[charliep]

The final was $183/tonne and Sept. PRO was $168/tonne. Given all sales activities would have been completed by September (including inventory valuation), it becomes obvious the extra $15/tonne was a CWB/operations decision around allocation of revenue or expenses.

[charliep]

From the CWB year end presentation, about 180,000 tonnes. Don't know split but would be surprised if the B pool had 50,000 tonnes in it.

[kato]

That's sure a lot less money than they quote for setup of a new plant. Keystone processors in Winnipeg is planning on spending a lot more than that just to upgrade an existing plant to federal standards.

[parsley]

The Grain Growers of Canada, the WCBGA, the WCWGA and the Maltsters etc. should jointly called a PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITY meeting, Media invited and the CWB is TOLD to attend to answer questions that represent producers. Request facts on sheets from the CWB. Ask Merchant Law Group to be there. Pars

[stubblejumper]

LOL stupidist thing I have ever heard.