NFU crazy, or am I missing something?

[parsley]

Talk to urban farmers. WHY do they want to grow their own food?

Could this possibly influence their decision?:

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/12/news-update-farm-animals-get-80-of-antibiotics-sold-in-us/

pars

[burnt]

You know Parley, after reading that linked story,I can't blame the consumer for not liking some of the things that happen in mainstream ag production today.

I don't like them either.

BUT -

BUT - if they don't like the things that have become standard farming practice to operate (survive) within today's market values, then they had better be ready to pay whatever it takes to produce the kind of food they want on their plates.

And that is where the trouble lies.

[grassfarmer]

Burnt,
There you go threatening the consumer again - remember the customer is always right. Why will you only deliver them the product they want for far more money than they pay currently? There is plenty of money in the food production chain to adequately reward all participants if it were fairly distributed. Why seek to take more out of the consumers pocket rather than the packer or retailer?
I can produce and sell a product my customers consider far superior to store bought, reared on grass with no antibiotic use for less money than they could buy the same cuts at the supermarket.
The trouble lies not with the customer paying too little but the middlemen taking too much. I realise that may involve some different thinking for some of the corporate lovers out there but it is the reality.

[parsley]

grassy, If I lived near you, I would hopefully be your customer for grass fed beef. And I can pay wheat you ask, or barter, or you can say, "No."

Willing buyer and willing seller.

I like what you are doing and good for you. I hope you do really well financially.

Right now I do not some product offerred in too many stores.

In local areas, much of the hamburger is grown locally, and ground locally. So the batch I buy is ground from maybe 10 head butchered that week

City people? Their hambuger is ground in huge huge batches...maybe 5000 head butchered, cut and ground in a batch

Your chances of disease, hormone saturation, mad cow, contamination, etc.....from large batches increase.


But you do say this, grassy:"if it were fairly distributed"

We've passed stringent regulations. They have not been acted on. The governme nt does not do its' job. Nor do gov't entities.

Isn't the best way to decide profit is to allow the buyer both the choice of whom he buys from, and the price he pays? That is what you are doing! You are circumventing corps, the middleman, the establishnment. And recieving a premium! One YOU HAVE EARNED.

I too, wish to circumvent the CWB and sell for a premium. They are a detriment. They sell the grain as cheap as they can to dump it.

Fair distribution should not be part of how you sell steaks! If I want to buy them from you, based on trust and taste, why should either one of us worry about fair distribution?

A large meat plant needs the consumer. If I don't buy...he's toast. If you don't sell to them, he's toast.

If you grow and sell, you should be paid amply for it. imho, grassy. Pars

[burnt]

The customer is always right . . .hahaha.

A wise person once put it this way, the customer isn't always right, but he is always the customer . . .

As for the rest of my post - it stands for itself.

[gustgd]

Well played grassfarmer....

Just like moving cattle isn't it.
Someone don't have to yell and scream Just apply pressure, and animals go where you want.

I started a thread on why the NFU would want to change the definition of farmer, thinking maybe I missed something.
You quite masterfully got people off on a tangent of organic vs conventional.

and YES for the record I think that $10,000.00 in gross sales is much to low for the definition of a farmer. maybe 10k net??

[gustgd]

and parsley. You know better it's a vote of people who've applied for permit books, not farmers.

[grassfarmer]

Pars, You wish to circumvent the CWB and sell for a premium. Fair enough but remember without the CWB you will still have to circumvent the corps, the middleman, the establishment. That is the reality I think too many of the CWB opposers don't think about. It's easy to say we can sell to Cargill today and we are happy with their prices. Consider that they might be buying you off to get your support.
It happened in Eire when beef processing plants put the prime cattle auctions out of business by offering an extra penny a pound for farmers to deliver direct to the plant. It took years but the proud boast of the meat plants is they broke the auction system and it only cost them a penny. Prime cattle prices there are usually now the lowest in the EU - because there is no competition.
It happened in the UK when the Milk marketing boards lost their monopoly - milk plants offered premiums to producers who helped them break the monopoly. In the decade after they succeeded in getting rid of the monopoly all milked traded at 2/3 of the promised premium price and 3/4 of the price it had been when the monopoly was in place.
I laugh every time I read about the wonder of the "free market" system.
Look at Cargill and their beef processing facility in Alberta. They received AB Government funding to locate and build at High River in the first place. During the BSE episode they received more Government funding to expand and modernise their plant to handle the larger numbers of cattle. At the same time the same AB Government was telling beef producers that they "would not get into the beef business" even to provide bridge financing to help producers build their own packing plants. If this had happened we could have introduced more competition into the marketplace and raised live cattle prices. They have been allowed to take over other businesses and further reduce competition always being rubber stamped by the competition bureau. Just before Christmas Cargill got another substantial Government handout to help "operational efficiencies" at their plant.
What is free market about this? You couldn't create a more controlled anti-competitive trade environment if you wanted to. You have a system where the producer has been handicapped by their own Government in favor of an American corporation. And this is the model of the successful "free market" system you aspire to?

[parsley]

No matter the voters, my point was there were other conventional farmers voters could have selected if they didn't like organic.

So, my point was, there is no problematic difference between the organic candidate and the conventional candidate.

Farmers CAN work together if they are willing.

btw, gusty, INCOME

I took a hard look at net income. At gov't program-income.

Some drool over the vision there should be a couple of hundred "professional farmers at least over 50 quarters and recieving gov't bailouts. The rest should be bought out and sent packing.

It is a specific vision.

Are the farmers recieving massive continual annual gov't tax dollars via payments more rightful to be deemed a 'farmer' than a small farmer on no government programs? (I concede that the big scooper FEELS entitled)

Long term, which farmer is more sustainable? Valuable to community and country?

The sharp clean up pencils who have to quietly slide in and WRITE DOWN more debt AGAIN for the glitzy boys, tell me, the NET of farms without gov't dollars has been dismal.)

Does it boil down to :

The small independent who pays his own way vs the lobbying dependent with grandiose visions?

Why is the CWB still in existence?

As you well know, many of the seed growers have large acerages, but they vote for the continuation of the Wheat Board, because they themselves, bypass the Board via their special concessions with export permits. They uhold the staus quo and you should know it. Most would not blink an eye if an attempt was made to organize other grains the same way.... tie up bucket and burnt in regulation, but print their own canola export licenses.

Voting in this election was not the result of older permit bookers in Florida. Pars

[parsley]

You forget organics circumvented all of them, grassy.

So can grass fed beef if you have some faith in those you team up with. You are not a victim. You can steer the entire ship, if you should choose. Pars

[wd9]

As per a video post a while back on Agriville at least 70% of the organic food wasn't even organic. There will always be opportunity to sell anything to anyone for any price if marketing and sales have done their homework and know just how much cash can be seperated from the consumers hands. Case in point, $11 a pound canola seed is sold out before the previous crop is even harvested.

A local/urban farmer that is well vertically integrated will probably be the last one to go broke. I know one who sells slough grass bales as short as a small baler can make and sells them as dog grass for obscene profit. The only problem he has? Not enough sloughs. 1 dog owner buying a 5 inch bale for 10 bucks for their beloved pet does not see it as expensive. Growing 100,000 tonnes of wheat for minimal net is that much better or secure relying on exports to a broke US? Not likely. If the economy crashes that much, we are all severely screwed.

[gustgd]

Different policies for farms of different size

Dec 24 2010 The general manager of the Christian Farmers of Ontario, John Clement, writes a regular commentary. His latest is an interesting piece of how farm policy increasingly needs to pay attention to the “missing middle.” There are a growing number of small producers who have less than $100,000 in annual gross sales. Some of these producers serve a domestic market that wants to buy local. There are also a growing number of producers with gross sales of over $250,000 a year. However, there are fewer and fewer producers that would be considered middle size. That’s the “missing middle,” those between $100,000 and $250,000 in gross sales. It may make sense to design different farm programs for farms of different sizes. Some argue that small farms should receive public support through payments for environmental goods and services, while farms operating on a more commercial basis should get their support through income stabilization programs. We’ve never really figured out our farm policy objectives in this country, but the needs of a farm generating less than $50,000 a year in gross receipts are pretty different than one that’s generating more than $500,000. I’m Kevin Hursh.