Durum Saga

[biglentil]

CGC and SGS are totally useless in a visual based grading system. Here's what surprises me. Why don't producers have vom testing, protein testing, falling numbers testing on their own property?? Why don't producers have significant grading training?? I've had dozens of producers in our facility with durum samples and wouldn't know a fuzz kernel from a peanut. This simply blows my mind

No doubt there is some ugly durum out there but even the nice stuff gets thrown under the bus. Why because they buy it for chicken scratch and sell it as milling. Blaming the farmer because they haven't tested enough is no fricken solution. Ive had 5+ different grades out of the same sample pail including Sgs, intertek, and three line co's its all over the map from #1 to #5. What do I have?

[JDGreen]

No doubt there is some ugly durum out there but even the nice stuff gets thrown under the bus. Why because they buy it for chicken scratch and sell it as milling. Blaming the farmer because they haven't tested enough is no fricken solution. Ive had 5+ different grades out of the same sample pail including Sgs, intertek, and three line co's its all over the map from #1 to #5. What do I have?

You have what I had before processing.. Incredibly frustrating.

[wmoebis]

No doubt there is some ugly durum out there but even the nice stuff gets thrown under the bus. Why because they buy it for chicken scratch and sell it as milling. Blaming the farmer because they haven't tested enough is no fricken solution. Ive had 5+ different grades out of the same sample pail including Sgs, intertek, and three line co's its all over the map from #1 to #5. What do I have?

I've beat that drum to death! There is no universal standardized accredited training in the whole industry. All elev staff and third party inspectors should have to take and pass an apprenticeship type course. And rewrite a yearly exam.

If you disagree with the elev on grade or dockage you can send to CGC along with $50 to get a binding grade/dockage but the CGC doesn't follow up to see why they graded or dockage was wrong. Do they need more/some training, do they not understand proper grading or were they trying to rip you off. If later it is against the law, can be penalized and written right in the Gain Act.

We need Grain Farmers Advocacy Office so we have an avenue to get to the bottom of all the needs of grain industry. We used to have Office of Assistant Commissioners but last gov't never filled chairs, lets hope this gov't sees how important they were and does something about it.

[bucket]

The CGC should act as a regulator on farmers behalf and do random audits and visits at elevators.....

Instead the CGC just tells farmers to sell subjet to grade based on a probed sample that the farmer actually may never see.

[sumdumguy]

Because we lack definative, market-directed grading standards along with government labs that back up that piece of paper, we are getting screwed by the grain companies - I think. We had a similar situation in lentil grading in the mid-eighties until the government set up CGC offices across the prairies and official grading was to be our saving grace. I think Goodale was at the helm at that time. Anyone remember Donna Welke? I want her back. One phone call was all it took. Now we have FA. Harper crapped all over prairie ag. and dismantled everything. Just saying.

What we need is labs, government grades with DON, falling numbers and Vomi and of course, no more Fuzz. We gotta figure this out. Its not the first time farmers were faced with a challenge like this. Look at potatoes in MB, being sprayed by air every few days because they figured it out!

[wmoebis]

That is the office I refer to Donna Welke and Hartman Nagel etc. Office of Ass't Commissioners.

Even after CPC's own review of CGC (Compas Review 2004) where it was recommended opening a Grain Farmers Advocacy Office, they never even listened to their own recommendations from their review.

Fine to do away with inward inspection but at least make the grain company graders take manditory training and have 3rd party inspectors write annual exams just like CGC inspectors had to. Grading hasn't changed just who is doing it. Fill the holes that were left.

[farmaholic]

sumdumguy...Donna Welke prevented SWP from stealing malt barley from me for feed price. The unload at the other end "supposedly" had X percent wheat in it.....the lockbox with my sample had none!

And people wonder why I'm so ****ing cynical! I've been doing this for over 30 years and seen enough. There's always a ****ing angle and when the current one no longer works another one is found! Remember what I said in a different post....respect is reciprocated when its received.

How's them negative waves 101?

[farmaholic]

It's almost funny.....after I cleaned my durum over seives and a gravity table, taking 8% out as screenings, one company's pick results for fusarium were about 2% higher than before cleaning......where the **** is the professional accountability? They are picking away at my value!

Oh ya....and we're hard to deal with.

The previous comment about $4+ feed prices being close to lower quality milling grain prices speaks volumes.

[sumdumguy]

You're not going to get an argument from me. The fox is in charge of the chicken coup.

[farmaholic]

You have to applaud the guys who try to help themselves, they make the effort and spend the money to try to improve their grain quality. Only to be beaten with the vomitoxin stick. Don't say I didn't warn you bucket!

And what drives me ****ing insane is there is no repeatable accuracy to that test either. Tolerances so ****ing low that being a "little out" with test results can make a significant difference.

Grinding a miniscule amount of grain that could represent 5, 10, 20 thousand bushels. Talk about the luck of the draw! Adding dilutant, and test solution at different stages(hopefully in exact quantities). Properly mixing. How accurate is the process, how much room for human error? The monotony and fatigue lead to carelessness.

We are not talking chump change either....tens of to hundred thousand dollars for some guys with large volumes. But that's ok....be happy because the grading, testing and accountability we have is as good as it gets for "now"!

[farmaholic]

Courtesy of Weber's newsletter.

The Durum "Asking" port price for #1CWAD is quoted by AAFC at about $10.00/bu. Prices are down about $30/t at Thunder Bay and about $27/t at Vancouver from two weeks earlier. What are you being offered for #3, would you say that's a fair "discount"?

[farming101]

I think I've said at least twice this fall that #3 durum should be $1-$1.50 higher.
Farma, what you were sayin' isn't negative waves it's the sad reality of this year's durum market.
Any one who gets a check for #3 in their hand just breathes a big sigh of relief when in reality
there is a big margin between farmgate prices and port prices for #3