Mr Butter's letter

[coppertop]

grassfarmer, the intent of holding a meeting is to allow producers to become more aware, get their questions answered and perhaps even give the folks at Alberta Agriculture and ABP some producer feedback on what might be tweaked to allow the system to work more smoothly.
I, too, have used CCIA tags from the 'get go'. Have all the birth info on my calves readily available and can age verify with little problem.
As far as the checks go, many producers still do not have their first check much less cash it.
I personally called AFSC on Tuesday, nobody could tell me a thing about the Livestock Strategy, but I did have a wonderful conversation with a very nice young man about the lovely fall colors, weather, etc. He advised that someone would return my call the following morning, guess what, I am still waiting !

As far as Gerry Ritz' comments, I agree, he should have stuck to business vs shooting off his mouth, but I also feel that there were staff in his department that still had ties with Easter and are bent on making an election issue out of it.
Time we forget about personalities, dumb comments and negativity, and stick to issues, and that comment is aimed at every political party, they all need a good kick in the butt for some of their comments. With the exception of Elizabeth of course, her issues are having us all riding bicycles and growing legal 'pot' !!!!! LOL

[smcgrath76]

Well, this thing will never die. I think AB Ag has stepped back a bit in attitude if not in deliverables from the ALMS program.
We are not able to individually age verify our calves to the exact day. Being forced to do so would represent a significant cost to our operation. This is not to say we can't change how we do things, but our costs would increase significantly. Some of this is actual cash costs and some is because we value our time.
I do support the idea of automated traceback with readers on trucks, etc. I think this would represent a great step forward. One issue I could see is liability for the transporter. What happens if the reader misses an animal on the way into the truck? Who is responsible?
There are a lot of challenges to the program no matter what side of the issue you are on. And for the record, I still don't see how it gets anyone any more money for their calves or their work. Obtaining extra money is the job of the individual operation and whoever they choose to cooperate with.
I don't agree that AB has the best beef in the world hands down, and while I do agree that food safety is perhaps our most important responsibility, I am also convinced that the Canadian system to enforce it could use a huge list of improvements, and I am also rather convinced that it is a cost, rather than a market opportunity.

[sagewood]

Grassfarmer, I deliver my calves to the feedlot myself so that I know they arrive clean and healthy. Same to the auction mart, so the price I get is not discounted from the feedlot or the auction mart. Therefore, if I need to purchase and operate a 'reader' my cost of doing business will most certainly increase--as will the extra labour that I will have to hire so I have someone at the trailer gate operating the reader and have myself pushing the cattle along the alley. Further, as Sean stated, if my read list and the auction mart read list do not agree at the end of the day--who picks up the loss and whose list is correct? I have already experienced the auction mart cost of replacing an RFID tag on a calf. I know full well (because I checked each calf prior to loading) that all my calves had RFID tags--however, on sale day--one tag was missing--so of course the cost of labour and the tag came right off the top of my cheque. Now as painful as this was, I can hardly imagine how difficult it would be to prove that the auction mart did not sell one of my calves somewhere else along the line because their reader missed one of my calves. I know this is a long story, but I do see more work,cost and vigilance being required at every point on the system until I actually get the cheque in my hands that is due to me.

I don't have any problem verifying an actual day of birth on my calves because I have a small herd. I can see that those breeders with 200 - 400 head would find it next to impossible to verify the actual day on each calf unless they had someone dedicated to that task during the entire time of their calving. Again--more cost and this is being down loaded on the cow-calf producer as have all the rest of the costs that have been incurred during this BSE BS.

I see on another farm site that the Ontario think tank (George Morris Centre) thinks that the cost of the grain being converted to methanol will be borne on the backs of the cattle industry. Well really!!! And this is a surprise to those of us in the industry? I think had they just asked any of us in the business we could have told them all of this and saved them the cost of the 'think tank'. More reasons for bureacrats to take time off from their phoney-baloney jobs.

But I digress yet again. Obviously those of use with 60 - 100 head of cattle will be forced out of the business because of the looming economic cost related to same and only the 'big' players will survive and the cost of our beef will go up and hopefully for those who remain in the industry, there will be a profit.

[coppertop]

My understanding from information I obtained at various Livestock Strategy meetings, is that producers will not be required to have READERS in their own truck/trailers. This makes me wonder why a commerciallivestock transport would require them if tags were scanned as the animals exitted the trailer.

Lots of things need to be fine tuned with this strategy, and I am worried that it will be similar to AOPA, where government bureaucrats and a few lawyers etc. developed legislation only to find out that when it was put to the test by the regulator there were far too many glitches, and numerous amendments have been necessary to the legislation including ministerial amendments within a few months of the legislation coming into effect.

All the 'readers', age verification, traceability in the world likely won't stop outbreaks of things like listeriosis which has now claimed 18 lives !!!

[grassfarmer]

The tracking can be real simple - readers at auctions, feedlots and packing plants will pick up most of the animal movements. There really is no need to have them on commercial trucks except for direct farmer to farmer sales of breeding stock etc.
Coppertop, you say that "All the 'readers', age verification, traceability in the world likely won't stop outbreaks of things like listeriosis which has now claimed 18 lives !!!" - True enough.
However it is the tool we need to stop outbreaks of things like F M without needlessly killing millions of animals and disrupting commerce way worse than the minor inconvenience of BSE in Canada did.

Another point that strikes me in this thread is the comment that producers put a value on their time and they need to be paid to for it. Well that's good in theory but the question I would ask is if you don't spend time doing age verification for example how else will you get paid for that time? If you have an off farm job or a consulting side line that earns $50 an hour and has work lined up that's fine but if you don't age verify because you want paid for your time and instead spend your extra time in the coffee shop, or on Agriville, or at ABP meetings you're still not earning any more so maybe you should re-evaluate the "value of your time". I think in truth there are very few beef producers that couldn't make the time to age verify this fall - and you will get paid for it by a Government cheque!

[coppertop]

grassfarmer, are the GOVERNMENT CHECKS going to keep coming, age verification is an ongong demand on time. I don't even like to see government having to send checks, the check should be the one we receive when we market our livestock and the price we are paid should reflect the quality of the livestock and the age verification if, in fact, it is a bonus to our industry.
As for spenging time, I guess we never are compensated for our time in agriculture, we don't have the luxury Epcor has, which is to ask for a 5% rate increase because our expenses and returns don't balance ! As for sitting in coffee shops, maybe that is the pastime some indulge in, but personally, I don't have time. I have coffee at the auction market when I am sitting in the stands checking out prices or talking to neighbours, and that time is limited to an hour a week !!

As for $50.00 per hour consultants, good luck finding any !! Most of the consultants I know are paid at least three times that !!! Mind you, none of them are working in the agricultural industry!!!

[grassfarmer]

Coppertop, "I don't even like to see government having to send checks, the check should be the one we receive when we market our livestock and the price we are paid should reflect the quality of the livestock and the age verification if, in fact, it is a bonus to our industry."
All very well, and I agree with you, but in the big real world it isn't happening like that - what would you change to make it happen that way?

I wasn't commenting how much time you choose to spend in the coffee shop or at the other places I mentioned but I believe my point stands. I know I have spent more time posting on this thread today than it will take me to upload my age verification data for the year to the CCIA database.

My choice to quote $50 as an hourly fee is neither here nor there to the argument but I can tell you that I get paid $100 an hour for the limited consulting I do - and yes it's in agriculture - on beef and grass.

Why is there always the desire in agriculture to make producers look stupid for choosing this as their career? It fits in nicely with the P M crowd at ABP. Not once do any of you folks opposing the ALMS highlight it's potential benefits? Maybe it's not poor returns that are driving away young producers but elders that are constantly dwelling on the negatives and in doing so missing the opportunities. I'm increasingly disappointed with the attitude I see in Alberta - I thought this was the "can do" province not the "can complain" province.

[coppertop]

grassfarmer what is driving young people away from choosing to farm as a career ? For one thing, it is the ability to afford the quality of life our younger generation desires.
For the young folks whose family has land that can be passed on, and parents who can help with machinery costs etc., there are opportunities, but for many young people the dollars they can make in other industries are tough to ignore.
Many of our farmers who are getting close to retirement age, particularly in the livestock sector, have not seem many good times as far as financial returns go, and most parents want better for their children than they had themselves, regardless of what line of work they are in.So it is difficult to expect these farmers to be encouraging their sons and daughters to follow in their footsteps.
In my community there are several young families who depend on the farm for most of their income, and it is a tough row to hoe. Many of them live in older homes, or mobile homes on their parents farmestead, without much hope of building that 'dream house' in the near future given the increase in input costs and the prices they receive for their livestock. A lot of the young families I know, with a farming background, have said they would love to be farming, but they are not willing to give up the things they consider necessities of life to do so, and it is too bad that is the choice many people who choose to farm must do.

[grassfarmer]

Yes, or maybe as I said "it's not poor returns that are driving away young producers but elders that are constantly dwelling on the negatives and in doing so missing the opportunities."

[smcgrath76]

I agree with the attitude issue GF. We have a terrible attitude in agriculture, we also have a very real struggle with rate of return and capital investment. The traditional model of farming to pay for land doesn't work too well in a land that is valued beyond its' pure agricultural capacity. I think we have a terrible lack of business training in all of the youth in this country, and a lack of enthusiasm in agriculture in general. We are very Canadian in that we are often not prepared to stand up for agriculture, but prefer to be looked on as the poor second cousin of real business.
This obviously does not apply to everyone in agriculture, but it is an extremely pervasive attitude.