CWRS falling numbers falling apart AGAIN!

[TOM4CWB]

CWB,

Isn't it time we tested for falling numbers on our wheat like everyone else in the world does?

I understand that the load pattern in the country has got out of step with the vessel-loading pattern in Vancouver.

Algeria has still not presented ships at the St. Lawrence due to letter of credit problems?

1&2 CWRS 13.5-14.5 low fusarium will be biggest mover to ThunderBay along with shipments with 5% fusarium CWRS to be blended in?

Iran is loading on the West Coast with WCW (2&3 CWRS, 1&2 CWES, 1&2 CPSR, 1&2 CWRW), do you still seperate all these classes, or do you fill each hold with a different class and sell it all at the same price?

I understand one Iranian ship had to be partially discharged as cargo did not meet quality specs with regard to falling number!

When are we going to stop fooling around and get serious about our wheat quality?

Blending my non-fusarium wheat with eastern prairie wheat doesn't do me any good, but it sure makes Manitoba growers insist on me being forced to be part of the "designated area".

How can I ever expect to get a premium price when you folks at the CWB handle grain sales like this?

Is this the best performance I can expect from your single desk monopoly?

How exactly are you extracting a premium for my farm by doing all this crazy quality stuff, and making my customers angry?

[parsley]

"Algeria has still not presented ships at the St. Lawrence due to letter of credit problems", you say?

You mean Tom4CWB, that no wheat gets loaded until the the Board gets a credit clearance? When did that ever stop them before? Isn't that where all this interest is coming from?
Is this why the CWB didn't accept any of the C series durum contracts?

Parsley

[charliep]

Some of the grain companys are doing falling number tests on wheat as it comes in already (not at the truck level but at a bin one). The system has not figured out how to take this imformation and use it in matching grain with customers.

From my memory, wheat is separated by class in different holds for milling quality with a major effort to have only one class in a boat at a time. Each wheat has different characturistics such that the customer would get poor results if blended. Grade is a different story.

The amount paid for the wheat by class is a matter of what is in the contract. Whether what is loaded is the buyers choice or sellers option is again in the contract.

One of the things that needs to be mentioned is need to be mentioned is the need to match the quality with have with customers needs/willingness to pay.

On our side not all the grain we produce is Cadillac/Merecedes quality. Weather can knock grade down. Other threads have highlighted that maybe we should be growing a higher yielding grain to fit the mid to lower end customer needs (at a lower price) - CPS wheat is a current example.

Customer willingness to pay and quality of competitors wheat also comes in. Our competition into Iran this year is likely Eastern Europe and former Soviet Union (previous years, it would have been Australia and Europe). Iran is a price buyer (with the tongue in cheek comment they want maximum quality at low price). Perhaps the expression you get what you pay for should apply.

[TOM4CWB]

Charlie,

I believe the specific Iranian ship mentioned in this report was from last spring, yet the falling number issue is still affecting this years pooling account sales in September according to Earl Geddes from the Westlock meeting on March 21st.

His explanation for the $2.90-2.95 sale of so much wheat was the low falling number!

Why was there still bad wheat being blended out when it could have acheived a much higher price in the domestic feedlot and should have been fed instead of importing corn from the US?

Isn't the net loss from this situation staggering when it was worth $4.25 a bushel in the feedlot to be fed, rather than importing corn and export selling it at $2.90 and recking our reputation for quality for years to come?

Then the fusarium influence of importing over a million tonnes of infected corn plus all the bad wheat and barley coming out of the eastern prairies, that will most likely cost Alberta it's fusarium free advantage?

Just how much will this long term CWB blunder/cost be for my farm, is this really an orderly marketing system at all?

[charliep]

Perhaps we can agree that western Canada could do a better job of matching the wheat produced on farms with customer needs. A major part of the problem is that nobody can be held accountable.

Bob Beard, purchasing director, Warburtons, gave a very interesting presentation at an outlook meeting I attended in Swift Current last month. In the early nineties, Canada came close to loosing Warburtons business. The main reason was lack of consistency in our product - the western Canadian elevator system is a master of blending and this wasn't giving Warburtons the edge in quality flour to meet their bread customers needs. They worked with the industry, the CWB and farm managers to develop a variety specific contracting program - specific varieties (hope my memory is right) of elsa, teal and barry. The result is a win situation from the customer level (high quality bread) all the way down the value chain (more profit for everyone keeping in mind that it requires more work on everyones part.

Leaving the CWB issue aside for the moment, how should the industry work together to achieve maximum value for high quality product? What about the lower quality end - the guy who sells #1 wheat (in the current system anyway) for less money?

[TOM4CWB]

Charlie,

I think it is obvious that the disconnect between domestic non-board marketing and CWB interprovincial export marketing is not allowing an "orderly" system that correctly distributes the right quality and volume, in an efficient manner, for the most efficient usage of the product.

So how do we change the system to correct the marketing situation into the most efficient effective responsive alotment of resourses that makes our prairie economy the most profitable?

If we do not learn from our mistakes, don't we deserve what we are getting...inefficeincy and shattered communities?

[TOM4CWB]

thalpenny,

What are the export standard falling numbers for our wheat.

My elevator manager said that for 2CWRS the falling number minimum was 275, is this right?

What is the minimum for the other grades and classes of wheat and durum?