Lack of leadership/vision

[farmaholic]

Just making fun. I fully agree GrainCos have been strangely "publicly" quiet. Has the WGEA made any public statements? Also, ask SF3 what I told him about being singled out....

[farmaholic]

Easy to play the victim role and let someone else do the complaining......

[furrowtickler]

Got ya, I hear you .

[bucket]

Good point. Last year P&H sent texts and emails with their daily prices asking farmers to call their MPs.

They were pretty quiet. Considering the families have the government's ear alot faster than any individual farmer.

There is no excuse for the system considering the winter we had this year. And the graincos are just as much to blame. Maybe more. They should have stepped up vocally last fall.

[bucket]

This time the graincos are playing the victim card and laughing all the way to the bank.

[TOM4CWB]

Bucket,

Demurrage on ships.. lost cash flow... unhappy endusers are not a good nor 'profitable' time for crop marketers/logistics folks.

The only ones making money... are the ones who had maximum historic profit... with minimum iron and work. The Alliance is laughing all the way to the bank.

[TOM4CWB]

What grain handler... in their right mind... would cross the great Hunter Alliance? Especially when the Hunter Alliance is cranky about the rail service legislation... which was well supported by everyone except Hunters's RR Alliance...

And now publically the RR Alliance knows in general... public support is against the mean spirited Wall Street RR Alliance that is hurting Canada.

[furrowtickler]

Tom - then why are the line companies not stepping up to the plate and swinging the bat for their customers then? Why are they not offering something for late contracts ?
Basically, accountability needs to be forced - and this has been brought up too many times but it is the key element . The line companies all force farmers to sign these contracts now months in advance, and in most cases farmers do this for timely cash flow - payment of some sort must be forced when the contract becomes late. We used to see the opposite in the pulse game at times - glad to take your peas/lentils but then be 3-4 months late paying - it was fukin terrible to cash flow and pay bills. This is an issue government must force - then maybe the line companies will put pressure on rail . Fighting the railways on our own is pointless unless we get some support behind us.
FCC and any input supplier should be a voice heard as well , many of their customers will be late paying bills because of late grain deliveries. But no one is saying boo ....

[TOM4CWB]

Furrow,

Where are the grainco's supposed to get the funds from.... in a broken system... that the endusers buying our grain are trying to avoid;

The transport service system (RR Alliance) pays nothing when they fail to fulfill orders...

Who EXACTLY is supposed to pay the money requested by you?

Review,

1) Endusers- NO they are hurt already when orders come late or not at all;

2) Grain Handlers)-No they are hurt by reduced handle and demurrage, extra interest and End user charges for not providing contracts on time and on Spec;

3) RR Alliance? Hunter is clesr... he is out to take more... not give back anything.

Sooo Grain Growers are the responsible payor... as it is our grain to start with.

make sense?

[furrowtickler]

The buyer of the said grain who has the date on his contract is who pays. They agreed to pay X per ton contracted by that certain date. Then it's between the line companies and rail to sort it out. IMO if we don't get thiat enforced , no change in rail service will happen . Until someone else besides the farmer pays for the inefficiency of the system we as farmers might as well just whistle in the wind.

[Braveheart]

Tom, where are the Graincos supposed to get the funds from? How about a line of credit like many farms have to?

Farms shouldn't bear the burden of financing failures throughout the rest of the supply chain.

[TOM4CWB]

Braveheart,

If our buyers are not able to conclude the letter of credit on a sale of grain... they get no funds... and must then borrow to pay growers. Force Majeure is better than overextended grain dealers... with overextended lines of credit...

I would rather have my grain any day... than have it stuck in a broken delivery logistics system with no payment. Any going concern will rack up millions in debt... if things go sideways and letters of credit can not be redeemed.

[TOM4CWB]

BTW CPTN

Pooling charged growers the interest costs... of waiting for letters of credit and logistics problems.. since the Initial Pymt was 55-60 percent... the CWB pooled the problem... it was still on growers account. If a CWB fixed price was contracted... the majority of the time... the basis discounted total payment by 20-40$/t... and the contingency fund was to take up problems we have now... as well.. which was also funded out of the basis and pools.