4. CWB Continues to Deny the Obvious
by Alan Tracy, USW President
The Canadian Wheat Board (CWB) is upset by language in the current Doha negotiating text that would outlaw export state trading monopolies like, well, the CWB. The folks at the World Trade Organization in Geneva clearly recognize that export monopolies inherently distort trade, a simple truth the CWB vehemently tries to deny. The CWB has generally lost that argument as the negotiating parties have come to understand that a monopoly's ability to fix their prices inevitably disrupts the trade that would otherwise take place. Lately the CWB has launched a lobbying campaign, asking western Canadian producers to complain about the Doha language to their government, even mailing out cards for producers to send in to Gerry Ritz, the Canadian Minister of Agriculture, demanding that Canadian farmers be allowed the "right to choose" their own marketing system.
This sudden CWB interest in a "right to choose" for Canadian producers strikes us as more than a little ironic. Western Canadian wheat and barley producers have no choice of where to sell their crops; they can deliver only to the CWB. A couple of years ago, the Canadian government polled barley growers and found that a clear majority wanted a choice. But when they tried to allow open barley marketing the CWB, itself technically a part of the Canadian government, challenged them in court to keep the monopoly and won on a procedural point. .A few years earlier, the CWB itself had polled producers and heard back that about a third wanted to keep things as is, a third wanted completely open marketing and a third wanted to be able to ship to either the CWB or to other buyers. So, even though two thirds of the producers clearly wanted a choice, the CWB disingenuously spun the results as two thirds wanting to keep the CWB.
The Doha round of WTO negotiations, if ultimately successful, will give western Canadian producers what the CWB has long denied them; the right to sell to whomever they choose. It is no accident that U.S. producers just across the border selling similar wheat earn higher returns, on average, that their Canadian brethren, due to CWB mismanagement and pricing games. The CWB is acting like the self-serving bureaucracy it is, and its newfound concern for producer choice rings hollow.
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The U.S. wants the CWB gone - then it must be good for Canadian farmers? WRONG!
The US wants the CWB gone because it lowers the WORLD price of wheat.
The concept of the CWB is sound but not when it is incompetent - filled with incompetent people and overseen by left wing whacks.
Come on Vader, I miss you and the gravy train you are on...
by Alan Tracy, USW President
The Canadian Wheat Board (CWB) is upset by language in the current Doha negotiating text that would outlaw export state trading monopolies like, well, the CWB. The folks at the World Trade Organization in Geneva clearly recognize that export monopolies inherently distort trade, a simple truth the CWB vehemently tries to deny. The CWB has generally lost that argument as the negotiating parties have come to understand that a monopoly's ability to fix their prices inevitably disrupts the trade that would otherwise take place. Lately the CWB has launched a lobbying campaign, asking western Canadian producers to complain about the Doha language to their government, even mailing out cards for producers to send in to Gerry Ritz, the Canadian Minister of Agriculture, demanding that Canadian farmers be allowed the "right to choose" their own marketing system.
This sudden CWB interest in a "right to choose" for Canadian producers strikes us as more than a little ironic. Western Canadian wheat and barley producers have no choice of where to sell their crops; they can deliver only to the CWB. A couple of years ago, the Canadian government polled barley growers and found that a clear majority wanted a choice. But when they tried to allow open barley marketing the CWB, itself technically a part of the Canadian government, challenged them in court to keep the monopoly and won on a procedural point. .A few years earlier, the CWB itself had polled producers and heard back that about a third wanted to keep things as is, a third wanted completely open marketing and a third wanted to be able to ship to either the CWB or to other buyers. So, even though two thirds of the producers clearly wanted a choice, the CWB disingenuously spun the results as two thirds wanting to keep the CWB.
The Doha round of WTO negotiations, if ultimately successful, will give western Canadian producers what the CWB has long denied them; the right to sell to whomever they choose. It is no accident that U.S. producers just across the border selling similar wheat earn higher returns, on average, that their Canadian brethren, due to CWB mismanagement and pricing games. The CWB is acting like the self-serving bureaucracy it is, and its newfound concern for producer choice rings hollow.
__________________________________
The U.S. wants the CWB gone - then it must be good for Canadian farmers? WRONG!
The US wants the CWB gone because it lowers the WORLD price of wheat.
The concept of the CWB is sound but not when it is incompetent - filled with incompetent people and overseen by left wing whacks.
Come on Vader, I miss you and the gravy train you are on...
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