Massive CWB rally in Ottawa

[charliep]

grassfarmer

A challenge I will put in front of you is provide some thoughts to caseman
about his question on an fpc versus staying in the pool. You have
participated in some of the investment discussion. Use your business savy
to make a recommendation and perhaps in this explanation why the heavy
discount between the fpc and the PRO or that matter the premium on the
EPO. Won't ask you to explain the difference between the durum and the
US durum cash price.

[grassfarmer]

So charliep what you are saying now is that the CWB is not the only buyer and/or seller of wheat and barley for the designated area. So why the decades of bitching about it being the only place they can sell, where they are "forced to sell"? By your admission they already have marketing choice. Makes 95% of the rhetoric on here redundant does it not?

I have no interest in attempting to answer your technical question posted by someone else, I don't have the expertise nor profess to have it.
I'd be more interested in knowing how much the AB Government has spent on this destroy the wheat board nonsense over the last decade - how many $million a year has it cost taxpayers including grain growers who support retention of the CWB? I guess you don't see the double standard there when there is all the talk about how much the CWB is spending defending itself.

[charliep]

Fight old battles if you like. I'm ready for the new world. The new world has potential for a competitive CWB.

I note your name and creativity in direct marketing beef. I don't think you would argue for a single desk in beef. Just a thought.

[grassfarmer]

That's where you are wrong charlie - I think a single desk marketing board has much to offer the beef sector. Google Northwest Consolidated Beef Producers a startup AB outfit post BSE comprising smaller feedlots and feedlots that were on the packer no-buy blacklists at that time. They put together a collective showlist every week and despite the packers knowing full well who was behind it the average prices achieved by NWCBP soon topped the weekly averages in the province. A clear example of marketing power achieved by working collectively to the benefit of participants.

[charliep]

Lots of examples where producers are working together to market their products and achieve premiums but none are based on legislated single desk.

That is the issue - not forcing it on everyone via government regulation. Organizations have to demonstrate value to their stakeholders.

[charliep]

Just curious on what your position was on mandatory checkoffs for ABP
and the move to voluntary. Will get into trouble with Parsley and from
there the discussion of ability to opt out/refundable but the original
question was should any commission have the legislated ability to a
checkoff with no ability opt out.

To the original post, I hope there are discussions with CWB in the
background about the new CWB world and what it might look like in an
open market. Too much like a game of Texas hold'em with the CWB all in
and poor hand at best/hoping for a good flop.

[parsley]

Each government elected, grassy, pursues the
agenda that aligns with their philosophy. AB
represented my views more than NDP in SK. In
fact, the NDP in SK formed a land bank because
their view of the world was state farming, with
government actively bidding against farmers with
taxpayer money, buying every chunk of land they
could find and then renting it back to producers

The ultimate single desk.

Except it doesn't work in the real world. IF you
want a high standard of living.
You defended farmland property rights as I recall.
I had presumed it wasn't one single government
land-desk? Pars

[parsley]

Pleased you are able to anticipate my views on
mandatory checkoffs Charliep. lol pars

[parsley]

The dollars the NDP spent in SK buying farmland
to sell back to farmers was obscene. The goal
towards a single land desk was the cause of the
grief

The AB Govt spent money trying to get rid of the
CWB single desk. The single desk was the cause
of the grief.

Legislated single desks are ineffective, expensive
and immoral. Pars

[bucket]

parsley

And those single desks are run by the same type of people. Very important to remember.

[charliep]

Alberta farmers have supported CWB change for a long period of time -
CWB producer surveys show this. You seem and others seem to argue
otherwise but as managers of $ 1 million plus businesses, Alberta
farmers have the ability to gather information and make decisions that
reflect their financial requirments and business interests. In reality, it
has been Alberta farmer managers that lead government policy - not
the other way around. Not really all that much Alberta money or time
spent on the CWB file. We can likely agree there are more important
issues. This too will pass.

Again, irrelelevant unless the current process is stopped in the legal
system.

[parsley]

Yes bucket, run by oberg-mccreary-roehle types.
But I did learn from the SK landbank fiasco, that
even ardent single wheat-deskers, did not want
single land-deskers in place. You can take my
wheat but not my land. In the case of grassy, is it
take my cow but not my land?

For me.. My cow, my gun, my land, and my
wheat are mine. Hands off. pars