latest Pro's

[craig]

With the Pro's coming out yesterday without much change and then backing them off to your local elevator values, it is disappointing to look at your net returns in a year when most crops reached historic highs in value on the futures markets. So the question becomes that with more investment money moving into commodity futures, how does a producer capture that. This seems to be an area that the CWB doesn't want to venture into yet the present day reality only puts more pressure on them.

[parsley]

You hit the nail on the head, craig.

Farmers have to focus on farmergate returns.

Those who want to avoid the money shift will employ three tactics:

1. Be dismissive.

2. Trivialize what farmers say.

3. Marginalize those farmers who question.

Keep an eye out for these tactics,and flag them, because they will be used to keep money going into their pockets, instesd of going into farmers'pockets.

Parsley

[charliep]

Observations.

CWB pool return outlooks are not relevant to farm manager decision making. Why is a $2/tonne change in a PRO forecast relevant in a market that moves at least 5 to 10 cents/bushel on a daily basis? What is relevant is the fixed price and basis contracts on any given day and the price a farmer can lock in. The price forecasting function itself should be outside the CWB - hard for the CWB to be a price forecaster, risk manager and marketer without putting in some form of bias into their monthly prognostication.

Farmers need the opportunity to cash price. The daily price contract has gone some ways down this road for wheat but only available over a limited time period, limited volumes and still tied to the over pooling processs for CWB risk management purposes. Process is not visible nor does it allow elements of competition among companies to attract business. Cash pricing could be open market or within the CWB system.

Playing the commodity marketing game is only half the story/process. Niche markets, investing up the supply chain, developing value chain relationships, etc are all ways of achieving higher value. Whatever system farmers choose has to support this.