Border may never open.......

[15444]

wd40:

simply put, its because our industry leaders have too much pride and are hoping to put their names in the history books as 'The Canadian Man Who Ended the BSE Crisis in Canada.' Either that, or they are all just a bunch of nimrods. Promote democracy, take your pick of the above two choices.

[Bruce14]

"There is no reason to get furious with those who pointedly tell you that 'you are where you are because you put yourself there,' because they are right?"

Now I am not being critical in the least but I think in fairness we ought to examine this a bit further.

No one told us we had to farm or invest in the cattle business. There were various gov't incentives put in place in different provinces however to encourage this. No we didn't have to do it but I know individuals who were told they had to diversify and it made sense at that time.

No one also told us in the '70s the amount of gov't intervention and b.s. that would be put in place by our own gov't as well as our customers. It's one thing to second guess interest rates, weather, fickle consumer demands, environmental groups and such in our own country but when you have to do the same with other countries it is a totally different ball game than selling some paint and nails.

Wooly Bear, I would have asked the clerk how she would have reacted if on last May 20th she had her doors closed due to no fault of hers and then opened a crack in September to allow only certain products to be sold and she had to sell them at a guaranteed loss. No one told her she had to be in the retail business.

How about a factory that builds widgets. They employee hundreds of thousands from the plant to trucking and retailing. They have been building those widgets for decades and all of a sudden one of the main customers for these widgets demand they be tested for a certain criteria by the Canadian Standards Council. The CSA won't put its stamp on that product because it believes it doesn't need to be tested for what the customer wants even if that test may save the factory. Are we to just simply tell them "Nobody told you to start manufacturing widgets" and then walk away?

Not all residents do understand however as they continue to have an abundance of CHEAP food and feel that is a God given right as a Canadian. To those folks I say that it takes X amount of dollars to produce your food and you can either pay for it at the counter or through government programs.

One other "choice" we are still able to make is where we spend our hard earned dollars. I will continue, and encourage others, to support those businesses who appreciate our business and support us.

No I don't buy into what that clerk said and take my business elsewhere after telling both her and the owner why I was leaving. I don't know how large of a community some of you deal in but I assure you the retailers in ours know full well how this is impacting them and appreciate any business we give them.

[hsiemens]

Harper may be right and he may not be right - but I've said many times, our politicians did cattle a huge dis-service when suggesting the border might open soon without any information to back it up.
I think the Americans will hide behind the R-Calf litigation for some time to come. The only thing that might happen, if Bush remains president, that one day after the election, some time next spring, he may say get that border open. That's the only hope we have of it opening.
Farmers have lost much of the goodwill with consumers, and getting angry at them won't help.
Many cattle producers are angry and when I meet one, I'm very careful how I respond to their questions or answers.

[15444]

I guess, Bruce14, that everything has risks, some minor and some major, and you just go with what you feel comfortable with?

No, BSE came about and we could do nothing to stop the fallout, but then, that is just a risk? In the whole scheme of things, farming is probably the most risky jobs one can have, with the exception of stuntmen.

That clerk takes the risk everyday of being involved in a workplace accident, being fired, etc. Although she doesn't worry and complain about it, I don't imagine it's far from her mind? If she loses her job tommorrow, she doesn't get a huge bailout package to cover her expenses for the next few months. She gets the pay she has earned and hopefully she was smart enough to save some of it? And if she can't find another job, the welfare option is always there (but not a seperate program to help those clerks that have been fired from their jobs during the years of ____ to ____?).

And if supply management in Canada was thrown out the window tommorrow and all the dairy and chicken guys lost all the assets involved with the quota, should we bail them out? Quota prices have been very good to excellent the past few years and any dairy producer that is sitting on 50-100kg of quota is sitting on his own little gold mine? Most logical people in the real world would take the money and run?

The biggest problem with all agriculture producers is that we don't treat our occupation like an actual job? We become to emotionally attached to it and don't cash in while the going is good?

[bombay_43]

I guess this whole discussion brings to mind, various situations that many of us, have been exposed to lately due to BSE.

For example, the oil field worker who stated that he was feeling sorry for the farmers, but not any longer, as they have had a year and a half to get their sh** together and build some packing plants!

Perhaps someone here could explain to me, just when the hell, the farmers suddenly became responsible for "building the packing plants"!!

Do you think that this oil field worker is contemplating building refineries if we drop his wages??!!

Perhaps in the case of the store clerk, we should also realize the investment she put into her job, in order to receive her weekly paycheck. Did she buy the building, the land, the saleable items in the store, etc.?? Does she buy at retail prices, and sell her products at wholesale prices??

I think that everyone better stop and take a better look at the bigger picture! The clerk invested her lunch kit, and does not even require a grade 12 education to be a store clerk. Don't even bring up what the farmer invested, in order to make the same, (or less) weekly wage as this same clerk!

I would shop else where as well!!

Incidently, this same oil field worker, keeps a few head of cows for his family members, drives on purple gas and farm plates, and enjoys the same deductions and farm programs as the rest of us! Time to decide who the farmers really are in this country!!

Have a good one!