06-07 CWB Prices

[Kodiak]

bsigg,

Maybe you can fool yourself, but you can’t fool the readers of Agriville.

Your comments about the Task Force Report are false. You are either deliberately being dishonest, or deliberately misinterpreting the report to support your politically based views.

Or, what I really suspect, you haven’t read it. So, instead of parroting the false information put out by people with a vested interest in false information, try getting a copy and reading it yourself.

http://www.agr.gc.ca/cb/index_e.php?s1=ip&page=ip61030a

Fact: The Task Force did not say a dual market is not possible. Quite the opposite. The report goes into great length as to how CWB II, which would operate alongside the rest of the trade, could function competitively. What the Task Force said, was that a monopoly cannot exist within an open market. Quite a straightforward and logical statement.

Fact: The Task Force Report explains how the CWB could operate without grain handling assets. In fact it suggests that with the over capacity in our system, the CWB may have an advantage over those companies with huge investments in their own handling system.

The CWB has 70 years of customer relations behind it, and a proportion of loyal farmers who would seem to support it no matter what its success in the marketplace. Why do you have so little faith?

[TOM4CWB]

wmoebis,

The Aussie Barley system for 2007 is a very good example of working pools and cash prices that maximise grower returns.

The ABB barley pool closed at the end of September 07, and returns over $430/t for malt and $410 for feed barley.

Many barley growers in Australia say they did even better than this on the cash market!

AND what did CWB customers get?

The "single minded" bunker mentality of 8 elected Farmer owned Directors has killed the CWB. NOTHING to do with PM Harper... Minster Strahl or Ritz. They have 0 control over what the CWB does. Goodale set it up that way in 1998.

This is Goodales Revenge... get Harper et el blamed for everything he failed to do... yet had the obligation to rectify. Remember the Western Grain Marketing Panel? 1996?

We are not even close to implementing this 1996 industry consensus report... because Goodale screwed up the CWB Act in 1998.

In Edible beans we have pool that operate on a contact only base. They are functional and operate with integrety.

The CWB CAN/COULD do exactly the same... IF they were not so Cotton Picken Lazy!

[Kodiak]

bsigg and Chaffmeister,

I realize it might be just semantics, but for clarity I think the Task Force did the right thing by being explicit and descriptive about the terms it used. But as you can see, no matter how clear, there are some people who will only believe what they want to believe.

From the Task Force Report, Chapter 2, titled:

"What marketing choice means"

"....."Marketing Choice" is a better term to describe the new environment than "dual marketing". The latter term implies to some that the existing marketing approach (a CWB with monopoly powers) could co-exist with an open market approach. This is not possible. Marketing choice implies an open market in which CWB II, as an entity operating in that open market, will be a vigorous participant through which producers could voluntarily choose to market their grain."

[chaffmeister]

Kodiak:

You're absolutely right. And I know better - I've actually read the Task Force Report cover-to-cover, albeit a long time ago now.

Seems like I've heard for so long now (over and over) that the Task force said a dual market wouldn't work that I didn't even think of correcting the statement - it seems easier to just counter it.

I'll try to get more sleep and be more alert next time.

[AdamSmith]

BSigg said "Without elevators or export terminals the CWB would be forced to use their competitions infrastructure to handle and transport the grain, how would that work exactly?"

BSigg,

Please explain how this is different than today?

Logisticly speaking, hasn't what you claim won't work, been happening for over 70 years already?

The only possible difference is the "force" part.

The CWB ACT reads "...every elevator shall be operated for and on behalf of the Board, and no person other than and agent of the Board shall operate any elevator..."

This notion that the only way something will work is if "force" is applied is the reason our industry is in a constant state of dysfunction.

Did it ever occur to you BSigg that in the absence of force, things can still get done and probably done more efficently and with much much less animosity?

I know it's a strech for some people to grasp, but 95% of what happens in this country gets done within voluntary relationships where people and companys are free to choose their partners and free to negotiate the terms in which they establish that partnership.

BSigg, lose the "control freak" attitude and you will be amazed at how brighter life and everything in it seems.

Or you could be like Burbert and every thing you see is rotten, horrible, miserable, glum, desperate and without hope.

[wmoebis]

Tom4cwb

I don't know if laziness is the word and I wouldn't make that accusation of anyone without full proof that there is no other reason. And, to be honest, am quite suprized that you would. Judging that you are quite a christan man by many of your previous postings and scripture recitals.

You have touched on the very issue that I am alluding to. If Mr.Goodale had the power as minister at the time to change the act, so does PM Harper and his colleeges. We all have been asking for accountability that might be a place to start.

I do not believe for one minute that Mr. Goodale had that much power to close the book on the CWB that even the PM's office or Minister's office can't have a look at the way it is operating and staying within it's mandate or do you think that Mr. Goodale had that much more influence and power than this whole Gov't.

I don't believe that Mr. Ritz does not know how and why the board is operating and exactally what is going on. He has placed colleeges in strategic places and I believe that he "knows all". If not through his office desk then at least off the golf coarse or over a fine bottle of wine at lunch.

If what you say is fact, to throw the whole thing away without first even knowing if it is working the way it was designed is wrong and irresponsible.

The PM's office of the day allowed the changing of the crow payment. An agreement that was to be in place forever. This PM's office can at least have a look at CWB mandate and see that it is being followed.

Like the old saying goes. "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water."

[TOM4CWB]

wmoebis,

CWB staff are in a very difficult position to be in.

However;

Personal Accountability still trumps everything else.

Since you brought it up... here is the very blunt reality of responsibility to reveal deceit... motivations... to NOT take the easy way out...

At the 2005 January Annual mtg. WildRose Banquet CWB Chairman was the guest of honour who spoke... and ended his special message... by saying this:

"Chairman Ritter said: You can get a lot done with a SMILE,

But you sure, can get a lot more done: With a GUN; and a SMILE."

Nothing was done to stop this state of mind... the lazy way out. Goodale was as guilty as anyone else.

Chairman Ritter couldn't resist the temptation... to jab us!

Mathew 23 Describes in detail the theological foundation of my stand:

"Seven Woes

23:1 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 23:2 “The experts in the law and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat. 23:3 Therefore pay attention to what they tell you and do it. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they teach. 23:4 They tie up heavy loads, hard to carry, and put them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing even to lift a finger to move them. 23:5 They do all their deeds to be seen by people, for they make their phylacteries wide and their tassels long. 23:6 They love the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues 23:7 and elaborate greetings in the marketplaces, and to have people call them ‘Rabbi.’ 23:8 But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher and you are all brothers. 23:9 And call no one your ‘father’ on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. 23:10 Nor are you to be called ‘teacher,’ for you have one teacher, the Christ.
23:11 The greatest among you will be your servant. 23:12 And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

23:13 “But woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You keep locking people out of the kingdom of heaven! For you neither enter nor permit those trying to enter to go in."

23:14 [NKJV]"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation."

23:15 “Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You cross land and sea to make one convert, and when you get one, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves!"

http://net.bible.org/verse.php?book=Mat&chapter=23&verse=14

Ritter and Flaman are perfect examples aren't they?!

All to fulfill the CWB mandate "Object

5. The Corporation is incorporated with the object of marketing in an orderly manner, in interprovincial and export trade, grain grown in Canada.

R.S., 1985, c. C-24, s. 5; 1998, c. 17, s. 28(E)."

HOW Could there be a better description of these folks and their state of mind...than the "Seven Woes"?

What have I missed?

[AdamSmith]

wmoebis said;

Like the old saying goes. "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water."

I've never quite grasped why people make this reference when speaking of the Canadian Wheat Board.

Yes, there is a Baby and there is Bathwater,

The Baby is WHEAT or more specifically, the production and marketing of wheat on the prairies by individual grain farmers.

The Bathwater is the CWB.

There isn't one thing the cwb does that wouldn't still get done if it were to disappear tommorow.

The CWB doesn't add any value to the activity, it only desires to control the activity.

I understand at one time (about 80 years ago), some individual farmers benifited from having an entity to make them feel "more in control",

But those reasons don't exist today. The open grain market has become the everymans market,

we are no longer restrited by lack of information, lack of competition or the lack of an ability to deliver large amounts of grain, year round.

Our needs are different, much different, and our abilities have match pace with our evolving needs.

The only restriction that exists today is the cwb.

Read the Act and you will see why I say the cwb is a restriction. Every word, every paragraph, every, part is about what CAN'T be done.

The CWB ACT has long since outlived it's value,

it's the equivalent of the Iron Lung inthe modern world of Medicine.

In 2008, it's proper and fitting place is in the National Archives.

[ado089]

I am personally discusted with how the CWB has performed over the past several yet I am even more discusted with our governments approach to rectifying this problem. As a young buisness man I appreciate the value of open markets and choice but I also understand power that a monopoly should wield. We see it with the, bacically, two remaining fert companies, and the hand full of chem companies, that when you control supply you also control price. Why should a single desk seller, yes I said seller, of wheat be any different. First of all the people in charge of selling should be canned they are clearly incompetent. It is understandable to miss read markets occasionaly but to consitently sell uder a long term average means you are stupid and need to find a new line of work. That being said this can't all be pined on the CWB, as mentioned earlier, the grain companies are agents of the CWB, this does not just mean for buying, it also applies to selling. It's clearly obvious that these people aren't so interested in making a buck for the farmer as they are for racking up another ton of buisness to make share holders happy. To add to that we have another ,more or less, monopoly sticking their dirty little finger into the pot. Rail freight and the relaibility of that "service" is discusting and would not be tolerated in a world of open competition. So that leads me to ask, is the CWB really doing that bad of a job or is there just too many people inbetween taking an undeserved piece of the pie? Another question is, does tossing out one rotten apple from the basket really make a difference if there are still two other left behind? It still stinks if you ask me.

[charliep]

Not related to the original topic but the commentary above peaks my interest and makes me ask the question about what the difference is between canola and wheat. Both crops have similar problems but the industry organizations and farmers have different approaches.

Heard a presentation by Brian Tischler on national canola organizations - specifically Canola Council of Canada and Canadian Canola Growers Association. One of the issues he highlighted was these organizations ability to work with all members of the supply chain and come up with a common voice.

Is there a wheat equivalent to the Canola Council of Canada?

Is there an organization that represents wheat growers and speaks with one voice that would be the equivalent to the Canadian Canola Growers Assocation?