A sledgehammer to the Cdn dairy industry

[Blaithin]

Name one country? How about New Zealand. Dumped a heavily subsided dairy industry. Now free to negotiate trade with less of argent on their backs.

Also suffering serious milk price issues and suicide rates amongst dairy farmers are soaring. Not quite on par with UK numbers but similar.

[blackpowder]

I thought the NZ was gutted in early 90s and was an export success story since??

[grassfarmer]

Fair enough Braveheart, NZ is the one that tries to have a subsidy free agriculture. It doesn't ensure trouble free trade arrangements though. Seasonally a lot of their lamb goes to Europe and the UK in particular. When sheep prices are low in the UK there is always a backlash against NZ imports yet the UK depends on exports of sheep to France and other mainland countries. When French sheep prices are low they burn reefer trucks transporting UK lamb onto the continent. Everyone thinks they have a right to export yet want to limit imports.
Interestingly with the milk price collapse in NZ the Government has made it clear there is no bail out for farmers - but they do bail out banks that lent to farmers to fuel the dairy expansion!

[15444]

Name a country who doesn't want it both ways. This very action by Trump demonstrates that - talk of Amerka first - taking a protectionist stance against imports yet trying to bully other countries into accepting more US exports.

Sounds like a great way to boost a country's productivity - can only dream of such a powerful business stance in this country.

[15444]

currencies are traded in an open market. Our currency is very much tied to the value of commodities. Especially oil. We have very little room to move the value a whole lot. Do you really want a dollar at par as an exporter? I don't. We would all take a shit kicking on prices.

I'll take a dollar above par all day long. Can handle a drop in prices as I source so much in US that the cheap retail prices more than make up for lost income - 20% drop income versus 50% retail savings. Not my problem that Canadian suppliers keep hosing Canucks on retail price when dollar is a par, they just bend over and take it. It's not as if Canada produces anything of value. You ship a barrel of crude to the US, and it comes back in a 20L refined pail converted into Canadian from US and pay a shitload. US imports raw low value product and creates incredible value.

[Integrity_Farmer]

Free trade and so called free trade agreements such as CETA and the TPP are not about trade but the corporate transfer of goods.

Dwayne Andreas former CEO of ADM famously stated “When it comes to agriculture, there is no such thing as the free market.” The same Mr Andreas in Winnipeg stated during the Canada US free trade debate. "Free trade is not for farmers but for corporations like ADM. Farmers waiting for free trade is like leaving the porch light on for Jimmy Hoffa".

This is a great article by writer and agrologist Wendy Holm of what happened after the deregulation of New Zealand's dairy industry. Their marketing board was eliminated, producers expanded their operations (many farms milk more than 600 cows) and now prices are far below the cost of production. New Zealand produces two and a half times as much milk as Canada. The world is awash with low priced milk. Foreign investors from Canada US China etc are buying up farm land, there are huge pollution issues and young farmers are termed "share milkers" http://www.theholmteam.ca/WDF.Holm.Sept.2015.NewZealand.pdf

Finally, Canadian prime Minister Brian Mulroney while debating Joe Clark for the leadership of the PC party made an interesting observation. Mulroney stated "Free trade is a threat to our sovereignty and you will hear none of it from me"

As it turned out we heard too much about free trade from Mulroney and the large international corporations (called the Business Council on National Issues) who bought full page adds in all Canadian newspapers and essentially bought the election for Mulroney.

[Braveheart]

Farm writer and astrologist, Wendy Holm? Astrologist? Hahahahaha. This must be the dawning of the Age of Aquarius.

[macdon02]

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13238705-why-a-students-work-for-c-students-and-b-students-work-for-the-gov

Chuck and integrity you should read this book. It'll explain why you are where you are.

[ag-boy]

it is about time supply management is coming to an end
milk in the us great falls is about 1.80 two dollar less than in ab Canada !!!!!

butter and cheese products mutch lower !!!

every dairy farmer in south alberta has feedlot to, but the feedlot can not start milking !!!

Europe got rid of the quota and works well !!! price of milk came down .

milk price to the consumer coming down !!! in usa


no body can start milken or chicken operation 4 to 5 mllion for that little quota paper !!!

monopoly ad cost plus protected .

[grassfarmer]

Europe got rid of the quota and works well !!! price of milk came down .

Yeah, came down catastrophically at farm level, put a lot of guys out of business. Didn't drop price in the stores though. What a good idea - let's do the same for grains, oilseeds and beef - see if we can bankrupt a lot of farmers and hand extra money to the processors/retailers. That's got to be a winning strategy eh?

[Blaithin]

Any dairy farmers on here? What is the current price they're getting?

I'd be very surprised if getting rid of quotas actually brought down prices in store as well. The quota system could use some tweaking sure, and the regulations, but I personally feel it's a leading reason for why Canadian dairy farmers aren't in the pickle dairy farmers are in in other countries like the U.K. and even US and NZ. The market would simply get saturated with milk.


If you really feel milk costs too much, get a cow. There's nothing in the law saying you can't drink your own milk. Just that it can't leave your farm.

Before you go out and get a cow for milk though, maybe try pencilling out the costs of raising a cow, feeding her, and labour and time spent milking her then compare it to just buying store milk.

[foragefarmer]

Dairy farmers deserve what they get, work hard and deliver a great product. I think there's far to many Agriviller's a little jealous of what dairy farmers make and wouldn't want to put the effort required to be a dairy farmer because they enjoy their holidays way to much!