Annual Inflation Rate 1.2%. Not!

[farmers_son]

http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2007/02/20/inflationjanuary.html

Canada's annual rate of inflation dipped to 1.2 per cent in January from 1.6 per cent in December, Statistics Canada reported Tuesday.
Lower prices for gasoline and natural gas counteracted the continued impact of rising housing costs, the federal government agency said.
The core consumer price index, which the Bank of Canada uses to monitor its inflation-control target, rose by 2.1 per cent between January 2006 and January 2007, following a two per cent increase in December. The core inflation rate omits some volatile factors such as mortgage costs, some foods, gasoline and fuel oil, and indirect taxes.
Across the country, the one-year change in prices grew most quickly in Alberta. Prices there were up 3.9 per cent on average in January 2007 compared with January 2006. However, that was a slower rate of growth than the 12-month gain of 4.7 per cent posted in December 2006.

[parsley]

You've got a suntanned outlook! Nice to have you back.

Parsly

[AdamSmith]

In comparison we have this in the Great Red North.

Elsewhere in agriculture, wealth is being created, in Canada, annomosity and hostility seems to be the only thing being created in agriculture.

I fear by the time we get our shinola together (if we ever can) we will be so far behind the rest of the world we may never catch up.

So, where's the evidence of the superiority of the CWB system again?


--------------------------------------
Bull market running past West's barley farmers

Plebiscite could break wheat board monopoly

Kevin Libin, National Post
Published: Monday, February 19, 2007

CALGARY - A crop-devastating drought in Australia this year has nearly doubled world barley prices in the past few months. But at the annual Western Barley Growers Association (WBGA) conference in Calgary, all farmers can do is complain.

"I was in Cut Bank, Montana, a week ago and Columbia Grain is paying $4.41 Canadian a bushel for [malt] barley," gripes Rick Wildfong, a barley farmer who travelled here from his farm near Craik, Sask. For his own crop, "I might see three bucks ... I might."


A lousy deal, and Mr. Wildfong has no choice but to take it. While U.S. and Eastern growers cash in on the barley bull market, Western farmers are, by law, required to sell their malt barley, or any barley type destined for export, to their one and only customer, the Canadian Wheat Board (CWB).

The barley farmers who gathered last week at a north Calgary convention centre are convinced that needs to change. They are pinning their hopes for a new marketing system on a historic plebiscite now landing in the mailboxes of 80,000 barley farmers from Alberta to Saskatchewan.

At the conference's registration desk, the 200 attendees could pick up a "vote for choice" sign. Maybe if they put it on their front lawn, they can convince their neighbours to cast their ballot to end the wheat board's monopoly over grain sales in Canada. Because for the first time in the board's 70-year history, it appears possible that its masters in Ottawa are willing, if farmers wish it, to do just that.

Some worry this plebiscite --farmers are being asked if they prefer the status quo, an option to sell to the wheat board or no wheat board involvement in barley at all -- may be the last stand for the federal Tories on this issue. It took Ottawa a year of bitter fighting with farmers' unions and the government-owned board itself just to get this far.

"We have a real uphill battle," said Jeff Nielsen, WBGA president. "It's not insurmountable."

In the past few months alone, Agriculture Minister Chuck Strahl has had to freeze CWB funds to stop directors from mounting an ad campaign attacking Ottawa's reform proposals; in December, he fired CWB president Adrian Measner, a government appointee, for rebelling against his ministry; and this month, he intervened directly after the board refused to pay the new president, Mr. Measner's replacement, claiming it had not been properly consulted about the appointment.

The CWB, meanwhile, is suing the government, claiming Mr. Strahl has overstepped his authority. Most recently, the board has been accusing the ministry of running a rigged plebiscite: The ballots, it says, are unfairly worded.

"It's gone even past the normal sense of the matter," Mr. Nielsen said. "This is pure politics. The board is furious at the government."

Addressing the barley growers' conference on Friday, Mr. Strahl reassured farmers that, despite the difficulties, "as soon as possible my hope is to move toward marketing choice," arguing that the monopoly system is costing farmers income and stifling innovation and entrepreneurship in the industry. Farmers in Ontario, he reminded the crowd, are right now selling their barley at $5.50 a bushel.

The Minister has called the plebiscite "advisory," meaning non-binding. He insists he will still be the one to decide what reforms, if any, to bring to the CWB. But when those ballots are counted after the March 13 voting deadline, a strong majority for either the pro-choice or pro-monopoly will be hard for Ottawa to ignore, admits Mr. Nielsen. And if farmers come out too strongly endorsing the status quo, Mr. Strahl could lack the political cover he needs to push through his change agenda.

Predictions are all over the map. Barley growers are generally more anti-monopoly than their wheat-growing peers. Polls show that in Alberta, where half of the country's 12.5 annual tonnes of barley is grown, farmers are overwhelmingly in favour of choice.

But ideological support for the wheat board remains strong in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, said John De Pape, a grain-industry consultant based in Winnipeg.


"A lot of farmers still see it as 'everybody helps each other,' " Mr. De Pape said. "I had one farmer say it doesn't matter if the wheat board is successful or not, as long as everybody gets the same."

Still, the yawning price gap between wheat board malt prices and private-sector rates could not come at a better time for those on the pro-choice side. Farmers today are using the Web and satellite TV to monitor the world market, said David Anderson, a Tory MP, parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Agriculture and a Saskatchewan farmer.

"Until quite recently, it's been hard for farmers to find out barley prices," he said. "But we can see now there is a big [price] difference between us and our neighbours."

George Groeneveld, Alberta's Agriculture Minister, believes the days of the wheat board's monopoly are over.

Most of today's barley growers, he believes, consider themselves as capable of competing in a free marketplace as their peers in Ontario and the United States.

"These young fellas and women today are very good at marketing their own product," he said.

When pressed, the Minister predicts the plebiscite will come out in favour of choice. At least he hopes it will. An end to the monopoly would be good for the province's farmers, he said. But he also wants it for his son, who has inherited the family barley farm, and is anxious to give life on the free market a try.

"The younger generation today simply wants more choice," Mr. Groeneveld said.

Klibin@nationalpost.com

[AdamSmith]

Parsley,

I couldn't even get away from it on the beach in Jamaica.

Even there, I had Americans asking me about the wheat board.

[cottonpicken]

Nice to see you catching up to the curve.

[kamichel]

In 1982 farmers were paying up to 125 thousand for a quarter section of farmland in my area, extra clean up work to be done. In 2004 that same land would sell for 65 thousand. Not much in it for an ivestor there, if fact the farmer purchasing in 1982 most went broke or would never do that again. These investors how do they manage these land bases? Here in Canada farmers have a hard time even hiring someone at 20 dollars per hour plus. I think the money is going to be in doing the work yourself, not simply investing in land.

"About time"

[TOM4CWB]

kamicheal,

If you had bought land in 2004 for $65,000, you would be close to double that value now, wouldn't you?

That would have been a good investment wouldn't it?

TIMING is everything.

[AdamSmith]

The way I see it, the thing that seperates Western Canada and these other jusisdictions (the USA in particular) is the infusion of big time capital investment by the profesional deep pocket investors into the ag sector.

I will say I'm getting a little numb from the cwb debate but it does have real world consequences. If the anti- free market mindset continues to win the day and the current phobia towards the big money boys continues, the chances of attracting the necessary capital to catch up to our competitors just wont be there.

Also to my way of thinking, this is real world evidence of important new found optimism within a sector that has had a hard time generating very much in the way of optimism. Ethenol seems to be the big driver but there is more to it than just that, from what I see occuring.

So I will ask this question to all. Would it be a good thing or a bad thing if we saw that level of optimism here in western Canada, where there would be ready and eager buyers of farmland (for the continuation of farming) even if it were land management companies and where that demand caused significant increases in land values?

I think it would be a net good for all involved.



kamichel even though the article doesn't express it explicitly, I suspect this land is being bought from retiring farmers and rented to local area farmers. So instead of old Mrs. retired farmer or Miss grandpa farmed twenty five years ago owning land and renting it out, the Westchester group owns it and rents it out.

[SASKFARMER3]

Again guys land values in Canada are cheap cheap cheap compared to the rest of the world. Saskatchewan has taken the brunt of the losses but it is starting to pick up with investors from Alberta or overseas buying. Also business in Sask are starting to purchase farm land.
The time to buy is know if you can get it. Can always buy 10 now for 750,000 or more and sell 5 in 10 years and have 5 paid for. Its all timing.

[kamichel]

Ok I was a guy who bought 6 quarters in 04 for 65000 a piece. I paid the 17 year loan payment but nothing more. But we have had a tuff go of it for the last 3 years also. Weather not cooperating. My calculations say next year will be the greatest year ever. Today I know I would not get my money out of that land.
I know there is a profit to be made but if a farmer cannot take proper care of the land then it is not worth farming.
Where are these people supposed to come from to take care of this land? After hour workers are just not going to do it. 100 quarters for sale here but good luck finding someone to farm it.

From 1965 to 75 my dad bought land for 5 to 15 thousand per quarter. That would have been the time to invest if you compare 1982 to 125 thousand. Best time to sell.

Sorry I just don't get the big hipe over rising land values when fert. machinery is increasing, and labour is hard to come by.

[cottonpicken]

Trust me karichel 5 years from now youll wish you had bought more.

Sask farmer you stole that land at what 183 an acre-good move imo.

Scrub land in latvia is 1000$ an acre.

Our time has come, no cwb,rairoad,government,machiery dealership or fertilizer price is going to stop what is about to happen to us.
Our LEVERAGE is the grain price.
The LEVER works both ways.
"GIVE ME A LONG ENOUGH LEVER AND I"LL MOVE THE WORLD"-cant remember the author

[parsley]

cp,

So are you buying land or hanging on to paper gold or do you have gold door stops?

Parsley

[cottonpicken]

I'm not in gold.
I found something twice as rare and fifty times cheaper.

[northfarmer]

cp, Uranium?, silver?

[wedino]

My guess = Uranium