bgmb - a few thoughts on supply management from a calf/calf guy -
1) For a long time I fully supported supply management on the basis that it gave a fair return to those producers who are in it. There is nothing wrong with that.
However, while I still support SM in principle, I no longer can support the ugly reality that it has become today. It has devolved into a monster that its originators never intended - ie- a tool that has allowed one sector of agriculture to unfairly set the parameters for all the rest of us (land prices being the most obvious).
2)SM has made it difficult to start and operate smaller innovative dairy product enterprises. So while providing price and supply stability, it has shut out greater market possibilities in the form of specialty products.
3)If you are a farmer or rancher, you should be the last person in Canada to complain about the cost of a domestically produced foodstuff. Do you think that food should be available to the market at BELOW COST OF PRODUCTION just to make it affordable to everyone? (And anyway, food purchases are driven more by choice than affordability).
That is ludicrous! First and foremost, the price of food should be such that it keeps the producer in business! After that, it is a social problem.
You should also then be in favor of keeping the wheat board (since it reportedly keeps the price of wheat artificially low)so that consumers can afford to eat more bread, etc!
4)And by begging for prices that mirror American values, you are also asking that the Canadian dairy producer participates in the same, dismal level of poverty that his American cousin enjoys.
It is not a simple, single issue of keeping milk cheap.
1) For a long time I fully supported supply management on the basis that it gave a fair return to those producers who are in it. There is nothing wrong with that.
However, while I still support SM in principle, I no longer can support the ugly reality that it has become today. It has devolved into a monster that its originators never intended - ie- a tool that has allowed one sector of agriculture to unfairly set the parameters for all the rest of us (land prices being the most obvious).
2)SM has made it difficult to start and operate smaller innovative dairy product enterprises. So while providing price and supply stability, it has shut out greater market possibilities in the form of specialty products.
3)If you are a farmer or rancher, you should be the last person in Canada to complain about the cost of a domestically produced foodstuff. Do you think that food should be available to the market at BELOW COST OF PRODUCTION just to make it affordable to everyone? (And anyway, food purchases are driven more by choice than affordability).
That is ludicrous! First and foremost, the price of food should be such that it keeps the producer in business! After that, it is a social problem.
You should also then be in favor of keeping the wheat board (since it reportedly keeps the price of wheat artificially low)so that consumers can afford to eat more bread, etc!
4)And by begging for prices that mirror American values, you are also asking that the Canadian dairy producer participates in the same, dismal level of poverty that his American cousin enjoys.
It is not a simple, single issue of keeping milk cheap.
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