SASKATOON – Pork producers in Saskatchewan have voted to accept a temporary dual marketing system that allows producers to sell through the provincial hog marketing board or on their own.
“It was viewed by the majority as the only fair solution,” said Florian Possberg, a Humboldt hog producer who lobbied for dual marketing.
Producers who said they could get higher prices than those offered by SPI Marketing Group, can now sell their hogs on their own. Those who decide to leave the marketing agency can return any time, but they must contract all production to SPI for six months and accept the lowest pool price for the first four weeks.
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Former SPI director Richard Klassen of Wat-rous said the contract period was necessary to avoid lowering the pool price with producers jumping in and out of SPI. The proposal will be reviewed at the annual meeting in April.
“The motion had compromises on both sides. The delegates took a step of faith,” said Klassen, who along with Possberg worked out the eight-point proposal and presented it at the semi-annual meeting last Thursday.
SPI was locked in a dispute with producers who wanted to sell hogs without going through the agency. The temporary solution gives each side a cooling off period, said Ivan Stomp, a proponent of a dual marketing system.
Although he wasn’t completely satisfied with the proposal, the Lanigan producer said it was a “good move towards a happy ending. There’d have been chaos if it didn’t happen. It would have got uglier than it had in the past.”
A recent Court of Queen’s Bench judge ruled Stomp couldn’t bypass the hog marketing agency, and Stomp was considering an appeal. As part of the new proposal, all legal action on both sides was dropped.
A contentious issue was the failure of some producers to pay their marketing board levies when selling to other markets. Under the new rules, a producer must pay the levies, but can pay them to the provincial marketing agency where they sell the hogs. If they ship to the U.S., they must pay the levies to SPI.
Predicts others will follow
Stomp said he will not return to SPI and predicts an additional 25 or 50 producers will also sell on their own.
Keith Stephens of Balcarres said he would have preferred to see the results of a study before allowing even a temporary dual marketing system.
SPI will use the information from producers who bypass the board to see if there is merit in changing the way hogs are marketed.
“It will be a futile exercise if you don’t take the information and do something with it,” said Klassen.
Most producers believe there is going to be some kind of change, and this interim proposal will “acclimatize” people to change, said Klassen.
