Salesmen and boys

[farmboy4]

"Selling all of the durum would have cost what, maybe a nickel or a dime at the time?"

That's seems like a reasonable guess. I'm sure some buyer or Accredited Exporter called up the CWB and offered to purchase a couple million tonnes at a dime below the CWB asking price and they said no.

"When the prices are at record levels you take the price, you don't sit back and wait for the rest of the world to grow more of it, which you know they're going to do because of the record prices."

Now I know I'm not as smart as you, so can you help me out by answering a question for me? In you world are durum buyer's complete morons?

When the prices are at record levels you DON'T take the price, you sit back BUY HAND TO MOUTH and wait for the rest of the world to grow more of it, which you know they're going to do because of the record prices.

[Fransisco]

"In you world are durum buyer's complete morons?"

No, the folks selling our wheat on our behalf better fit that description. They're the ones who let the big one get away. The big one that was created by the durum buyers actually competing with each other and bidding up the price of durum instead buying as little as possible once, as you suggest, prices started to be higher than normal.

There's theory and there's reality, your's and the wheat boards theory doesn't match up with reality.

I don't pretend to know it all like the folks at 423 mainstreet and their apologists.

But I do know this.

Farmers when left to themselves do a much better job of marketing their own grain than government bureaucrats under the delusion that they can somehow control the market.

[Fransisco]

"What signals other than what we have right now does the board need to send to get that job done?"

The signal that it is finally getting out of the way. That it's not going to forcibly insert itself between buyers and sellers anymore. That it will deal with them on a voluntary basis.

If it does this the job will get done. If it doesn't it won't.

[Fransisco]

BTW- Ending stocks at the end of 07/08 were 819,000 tonnes not 50,000.

http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/sdd5326

[jensend]

it seems to me that the end of july the consensus on this board was that the crop was in big trouble and quality and quantity were in doubt.

[farmboy4]

"The big one that was created by the durum buyers actually competing with each other and bidding up the price of durum instead buying as little as possible once, as you suggest, prices started to be higher than normal."

That makes perfect sense... if I was a buyer I would probably want to build up my inventory of high priced durum prior to a new crop being harvested. And as the projected size of that new harvest keep growing I would have starting buying even more.

And I know I would have keep bidding up the price if an additional million or two tonnes was offered for sale.

[Fransisco]

If you were a buyer in a bull market with all other crops going up at the same time you'd be saying to yourself "I've got no choice but to outbid my competitors if I want to actually get the durum I need." And those competitors include all of the buyers of all those other crops.

There are very few people who can actually afford to stop buying their inputs when the price goes through the roof. That's one of the reasons you get spikes like that.

I know plenty of farmers who bought their fertilizer at the top, two July's ago. They had one thing in common, they were buying as much as they could because they thought it was only going to be getting more expensive.

Buyers are buyers and they don't stop buying when there is a panic until it gets really, really painful.

In the midst of that panic in durum the Board had an opportunity to sell all the durum we had and then-some at record prices. But they didn't, they thought they caused it, they thought they controlled it, they thought they could keep the ball rolling. They were wrong on all three counts and they blew it. Now prairie farmers, once again have to pay the price, for CWB incompetence.

[agstar77]

It also works on the down side.

[furrowtickler]

As seen by the Suadi sale!

[Zaphod]

Bids to farmers in the US are much stronger than the PRO. If they are "dumping" their durum, I can understand why. How is it that US exporters can sell aggressively into the world market and still give their farmers a better price than the CWB. Why should Cdn farmers be left holding big inventory to supposedly support world prices and farmers from the US benefit from it.

If the CWB was really working in farmers' best interests, they would sell aggressively and move the durum through the system. A little more pain perhaps, but at least it would be short-term. The way they're going now, the CWB is going to depress the market for at least two years by stockpiling durum.

Everyone should be shopping their durum around on the non-board feed market. Open market feed bids in southern Alberta are better than the PRO for #2CWAD 11.5% protein. That will get durum out of your bins and you will get paid at least a year before waiting for the CWB.

[agstar77]

Which is it sell above the U.S. ,or sell below? You cannot do both.

[Zaphod]

I'd be happy if it was on par with the US. The US traders know what it takes to make an international sale, and still pay more money to farmers. Our wonderful board can't sell the product and the prices are still below the US. What kind of price signal is that? If they were actually extracting a premium from the market, I could maybe live with restricted sales and forced storage. But they're not.

Sell it to the feedlots I say. At least they value our product.

[bucket]

Does the cwb track how much durum gets sold off board? How do they know what is in storage? Most producers from what I am hearing have been overcontracting for years to empty bins. This is why the first call could not be filled until new crop was coming off. If farmers had the grain at the time of the call bins could have been emptied before the new crop combines were rolling.

Does the cwb actually know the inventory of their expropriated durum?

[Zaphod]

The CWB's bin inspectors will be out in force this winter. If you need a winter job, maybe...