WHAT IS CWB "SINGLE DESK SELLING?"

[TOM4CWB]

thalpenny, and the CWB,

In the "WHAT IS A DUAL MARKET" topic you brought the CWB "single desk seller" into the discussion.

I hope for a second that we could take a logical look at this topic.

Is the CWB a "single desk seller?"

I think CWB “single desk selling” means, the CWB is responsible for, and controlling the sale of wheat and barley.

IS the CWB the only seller on this planet with Wheat and Barley for sale?

Even from the “designated area” the CWB gets its Agents to sell over 50% of the monopoly grain, right?

Don’t you really mean, “single desk buyer?”

Wasn’t the CWB over 21 percent of world wheat trade a few years ago?

I believe the statistics show the CWB is controlling about 17% of world wheat trade now.

I believe the CWB tells us that we will produce less wheat in the future. What percent of the world trade in wheat is the CWB projecting it will control, if it is still here in 5 years, maybe 10-12 percent?

At this rate of decline, in about 15 years the CWB will control…

Do you consider this to be CWB single desk marketing success?

Now it appears the CWB’s idea of single desk marketing is that we can have more and more of less and less, until we have nothing at all.

Is this leadership, or is this a “designated area” grain farm funeral procession?

[AdamSmith]

TOM4CWB, your right about the CWB not being a single desk seller, but I'm not sure their a buyer of grain either.

In April of 1998 during Senate Committee hearings on changes to the CWB Act, Senator Spivac asked "How does the CWB have an advantage as a marketing agency over companies such as Cargill..."?
Brian White of the CWB answered "Although the Wheat Board DOES NOT BUY grain from farmers, we TAKE ownership of the grain in order to sell it.? He also talked about grain companies buying low and selling high and that the wheat board is different because it buys high and sells even higher. He obviously thought the Senate was full of idiots, maybe it is if they bought that line.

So acording to the CWB themselves they are a single desk taker of grain.

thalpenny, I posed a few questions for you in the "What is a dual Market" Thread. I would sure be interested in hearing the CWB's insight into the need for a multi-million dollar communications campaign at the Board?

AdamSmith

[TOM4CWB]

AdamSmith,

The CWB Act makes it illegal to sell higher quality wheat to anyone but the CWB itself.

The Canada Grain Act REQUIRES elevator operators to grade this wheat correctly.

Legally, there is no way out.

The "taking" part is a matter of opinion!

I wonder when we will be able to constructively start concentrating on making our farms more profitable, instead of spending all this time clearing piles of junk away that have been put in our road just to make our lives difficult!

Oh well, if they don't kill us, they will make us stronger! No? Not our skins?

Just think how well we will be prepared to market when the Alberta Government finally breaks us free!

[parsley]

Since you started this thread, Tom4CWB, there is one important aspect of single desk. AdamSmith will be interested in this, I think.

As a single desk seller, the CWB has a legal duty to:
1. market for what they consider reasonable, and
2. pool the proceeds,...........

all wheat and barley offerred to it by producers. OFFERRED is the key word here. If it is not offered, the grain is still farmer held, and the CWB has no duty of care to it. Nor any rights to it.

Parsley

[TOM4CWB]

Parsley,

I couldn't agree with you more.

I wonder if the CWB since they can buy wheat from outside the designated area now, (section 39.1)do you think that they will start forcing the rest of Canadian wheat and barley through the "single desk"?

So a question for the CWB.

Since 39.1 over rides section 32 of the CWB Act, when or has the CWB already started exercising its fiduciary obligation to impose the single desk on the rest of Canada?

[parsley]

This was one of the reasons why I asked thalpenny the question in the Value Added thread about the following:

A significant increase in wheat production in Ontario that has been predicted will have a marked effect upon marketing done by the CWB. Should the CWB deny Ontario export licenses, "because it will negatively affect marketing done by the CWB?

halpenny seemed to not understand the point and instead addressed the increase in production!

As you have shown us Tom4CWB, the CWB can now buy in Ontario. At the same time, will they deny Ontario export licenses , as they now deny DA producers, if Ontario is competing for Board markets? Should Ontario should start to shudder?

AdamSmith, Brian White does not understand that the CWB cannot "take" grain not offered to them. Or it would be called "expropriation". And Canada has some definite rules about expropriating. The CWB Act does not state that they ae expropriating. A guy I know let me study his research on the subject, and I it looks soundly done!

Parsley

[TOM4CWB]

Parsley,

Do you think anyone from Ontario would be brave enough to venture onto this site and talk about this?

Does anyone know any wheat farmer in Ontario that we could get to comment?

[AdamSmith]

parsley, since when has the CWB ever cared about what is legal or what is right?

The CWB and their operatives have told us the sky is green and the sun rises in the west and sets in the east for over fifty years. Sadly though most farmers have beleived their tales until recently.

If what you say is correct parsley, if I do not offer my grain to the CWB, I as a farmer am free to sell to anyone anywhere. The only hitch is the CWB will refuse to grant me an export licence unless I pay their extortion fee (buy-back) and it will also refuse to grant anyone I sell to inside Canada a licence to process this grain and sell it.

That's how it works today. How do we make the CWB do what they're SUPPOSED to do instead of what they WANT to do?

Do the pasta boy's know about this?

AdamSmith

[chas]

If our interpretation of the CWB Act is correct how come some lawyers allowed farmers to be conficted of selling wheat that was not offered to the board. What good is the law if the ACT is not upheld. We better find better lawyers. Chas

[chas]

I have not read the CWB Act but I can't believe that a another section does not cover and restrict the sale of wheat by a producer. The Section you refer to that relates to the offering of grain merely states that the board is committed to selling it for the best possible price for the producer the grain that is offered. It puts some onus on the CWB. You can not take each Section alone with takeing the Act as a whole. One Section may over ride another as it may not stand alone in an over all interpretation of the Act. Just my policemen days over riding a knee jerk reaction to what one Section states. Chas
I will get the CWB Act and interpret for myself.

[ceresent]

The current situation with the CWB monopoly begs the question: What will the single desk do to help me survive as a grain farmer in Western Canada over the next few years?

We already have established, and history has proven, that the CWB is a price taker in the world market, and they cannot increase the world price and pass this on to their captive supply - the farmers of Western Canada.

Well, can they then do something for us in terms of world market share?

On July 17, 2000 the CWB posted a paper entitled "Special Market Reports" in which they analyzed world trade in wheat and barley to the year 2008.

These are their own conclusions:
1. While world trade in wheat will increase 22% by 2008, the Canadian share will only increase by 3%
2. The Canadian share of the world wheat market will decrease from 19.5% to 16.6%.
3. World barley trade will increase 43% by 2008, while Canadian barley exports will imcrease by only 8%.
4. The Canadian share of the world barley trade will decrease from 16% to 12%.
5.Over the last few years, Canada was clearly the 2nd largest exporter of wheat in the world. By 2008, the CWB forecasts we will be a very poor 3rd, marginally ahead of 4th place Australia.

So much for all the benefits of the CWB monopoly to Western Canadian farmers!

Their own numbers show they are not up for the challenges of the future, and they selfishly will not let anyone bypass their ironclad monopoly.

[parsley]

AdamSmith says, "The only hitch is the CWB will refuse to grant me an export licence unless I pay their extortion fee (buy-back)".

What they tell you and what they do are two different things, Adam Smith. They tell the registered seed growers they can have the license. They tell a whole bunch of types of producers they can have no-cost licenses. So we know they can.

And some producers are denied. Some illegally denied. There is an utter difference between the producer that has committed his grain.....permit books, contract, buyback etc.....and the producer who has not.

AdamSmith, they have been refusing DA farmers export licenses for NO REASON, and that is not what the Act says they can do. There will be some very interesting things that will happen to the CWB because they have been groping outside their legislated mandate.

Once it is established that they have over-reached their legislation, producers will need to establish a different way of doing business. Elevators and feed mills are designated by Parliament as "works for the general advantage of Canada." producers and farms are not.


Chas, you can find the CWB Act

canada.justice.gc.ca/en/laws/c-24/index.html

It's important that youkeep in mind that the Act applies to all of Canada, and there are two functions of the CWB Act....marketing and regulatory. The marketing arm applies only to the designated area

This Act is your regulatory body. What the CWB says is often meaningless. What the Act says is Law, and that is what you answer to
Parsley

[chas]

Parsley: Thanks for the information. Chas

[TOM4CWB]

Chas,

I know this is difficult, but the CWB's power and control is over elevators and railways, or "works for the general advantage of Canada".

In 1925 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Canada Grain Act conflicted with 92 (13)constitutional rights of the province to control activities in that province.

The Court further ruled that a farmers own produce, in his own hands was not an article of trade, in the flow of "trade and commerce".

This is why the CWB Act controls

Trade and Commerce "IN" Interprovincial and Export Marketing.

Ungraded grain is not "in" the flow of trade and commerce.

I tried to explain this to the Federal Court in June but they were in such a hurry to get back to their golf game that they wouldn't even let me explain it to them!

I tried, maybe the Supreme Court of Canada will hear it???

They have been looking at it for over 4 months now!

But I won't hold my breath!

[TOM4CWB]

Chas,

I just went and checked, and all the information on my Supreme Court of Canada Application is up and avalible.

There are 3 option spots at the top of my election home page, and the one on the right is TRIALS.

Click on this TRIALS, and then go to each document, the originating notice of motion, Application to the Supreme Court, and so on. The top option of each one of these choices will take you straight into each document.

My seed issue, when is wheat wheat, and when is seed wheat not wheat!!!,,, is mixed in because it highlites the CWB's problem.

Why doesn't the CWB market export seed wheat? Yet they don't, and their isn't an exemption in the legislation!

The Attorney General of Canada taught this to me, at the Canadian Grain Commission, I wasn't smart enough to think it up on my own, so go have a look, when you have some time to think... real hard......