Wagner writes from Stony Plain, Alta.
The fact that the Canadian Wheat Board will not participate in the federal government’s task force on implementing market choice confirms that the board of directors has not planned for the future.
After several years of operation, the Ontario Wheat Producers Marketing Board has demonstrated a board can successfully exist and offer services to farmers in an open market. This is a fact which the CWB refuses to acknowledge.
The recently released CWB Harvest Opportunities (report) is more of (what) we have today – a monopoly supported by taxpayer funding.
Read Also
Agriculture needs to prepare for government spending cuts
As government makes necessary cuts to spending, what can be reduced or restructured in the budgets for agriculture?
This document proposes the federal government give the CWB $1.5 billion as a start-up fund when the government guarantee is eliminated. Since farmers were first elected to the board of directors, taxpayers’ money has subsidized the CWB with a payment of $85.4 million when it failed in wheat marketing …
Considering that our current federal government has more common sense and respect for taxpayer money, it is unlikely transition money will be forthcoming. But all is not lost for the advocates of the single desk and the CWB, as there is an opportunity to raise money from farmers. If the CWB is serious about the need for a start-up fund, it should ask farmers to voluntarily sign over their share of the $1.25 billion the federal government has promised grain and oilseed farmers in Canada. Certainly the CWB would be justified in its expectation that the most ardent supporters would lead the way with signed cheques.
The alternative is to face the fact it is not 1943, the world has changed, and farmers do not need or want bureaucrats deciding when and how much wheat and barley they can sell.
