Anyone see the story on CBC tonight, Global bacon shortage unavoidable.

[buzz]

Anyone see this tonight on CBC

These reporters are morons.

Blaming everything on drought and high grain prices. Consumers better go and hoard some bacon for the winter. This story followed the riots in Greece.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/story/2012/09/25/bacon-shortage-pigs.html

No wonder the markets are falling this week.

[Mufferaw]

Read the comments to the article. One of the first commings of the Apocalypse.

[burnt]

The comments are evidence of a consuming population so far removed from reality and so ignorant that it is nauseating.

I believe that the majority of today's consumers would starve in the middle of a late summer garden.

[oneoff]

So true.

And when that Apocylypse comes, will those new foreign owners be anymore helpful as neighbors than they currently are as numbered companies; and faceless linited companies.

Ponder who you would be most wish to have in your party while stranded and lost in a desert. I 'd bet you'd be hard pressed to quickly find a mere handful of persons you'd wish to help with your collective survival.

[wmoebis]

Just thinking (scary).
I understand it takes about 20 bus of barley to finish a hog @ $5/ thats $100 per hog. They say they they are losing $40-60/hog because of price of barley so to break even they would need to buy barley for $2/ Bus. To make any kind of profit they would need producers to give them feed.

I think somebody better start looking at other costs and start pointing fingers there. Grain producers better start to stand up for ourselves.

Ritz is on industry's side he wants price of feed to drop.

[Mufferaw]

When it comes to the livestock industry I would argue there are plenty of people within agriculture are far removed and ignorant . Oneoff you need to relax a little…foreign ownership Maple Leaf and Olymel are Canadian companies. My guess is people are trying to be funny regarding their comments and I guess there are others that think they are serious.
I think there would be a large number of farmers that wouldn’t make it if they had to rely on their gardens.

[burnt]

wmoebis - while I understand what you are saying about costs, I fear that when we look at trying to reduce costs, we lose sight of the real problem - food is just too darn cheap. There is not enough money in the final product to keep everyone in business.

Plus, we also begin to pit one sector of ag. against another, a battle in which the only winner is the consumer.

I'm sick of trying to make money strictly by reducing costs. And there is ultimately a limit to efficiencies gained by increasing volume to offset low margin.

The consumers of this country have had a practically free ride when it comes to the food they need to live.

A report on the news this week said that nearly 50% of meals are now eaten outside the home. Does that sound like food is priced high enough, considering that people are willing to spend more for the service than the actual cost of the meat or potatoes in their McHappy meal?

[oneoff]

Farmers are too relaxed already. Ever consider how not one other industry uses a farmer's financial business model in how their operation is run.

The similarities in production vs. sales; and deliberately attempting overproduction to drive down prices are non-existant.

[wmoebis]

You got it Burnt that is what I'm saying.

If Ritz wants suppliers to the industry to carry given industry he has to make it fair and sustainable. If he wants us to supply $2 feed, to say, the hog sector he should be telling our suppliers that they have to tighten up and give us affordable inputs and tools to do it.

Talking about more feed hitting the market and keeping prices low for the livestock sector down is nonsense. It costs grain producers principally the same to produce feed as it does to produce #1. Of course depends on factors that caused feed grade.

If he wants $2 feed, I have some, BUT it has been through the cows once.