New Farmer Owned Grain Company

[jd3007]

I like Klauses idea of a Farmer Owned Terminal/Coop/CHS. This idea could take off if everyone works together. You could look at including the CWB as long as they didn't bring too much old baggage.I know farmer owned ventures have a very poor track record due to poor management and farmer directors looking after themselves and their counterparts. But there are also many others such as WIT who are quite successful. I always hear how farmers bitch about how their grain companies are taking advantage of them yet I see them doing nothing about it. Im not a socialist by any means but all of you have to remember not that long ago Sask Wheat Pool, UGG, Manitoba Pool and Alberta Pool where all farmer owned companies and they did lots of business in Western Canada. They owned end use facilities and fertilizer manufacturing plants. An they were FARMER OWNED.Did they need to change? Of coarse they did. But going public led to the demise of farmer owned entities. Cargill, JRI, P&H, Patterson and LDM are privately owned companies. Glencore, Bunge and ADM are public companies but are not based in Canada. The only ones left are the independent grain terminals, pulse processors,the end use market which includes the beef, hog and poultry sectors, and the any small private processing which is small is western Canada. There is the US market which has been small so far but will grow if the rail issues if this year continue. A coop structure wouldn't work because you would have too many left wing proponents and ex CWB directors trying to pool everything, yet a public structure could have the company end up in private hands again because its all about shareholder value. I think I would have a serious look at how CHS operates as this could be our last chance to partner with someone who has farmers ownership in their interests.