CALGARY – United Grain Grower delegates have voted overwhelmingly to support an open North American grain market.
Not only do the delegates want to bypass the Canadian Wheat Board and sell barley south of the border, they also want the freedom to move their wheat into the United States.
While delegates didn’t aggressively challenge agriculture minister Ralph Goodale or chief wheat board commissioner Lorne Hehn when the pair spoke to the UGG meeting, the delegates made their views clear when they voted.
Demands for change
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For UGG president Ted Allen, the issue is no longer limited to a handful of people in southern Alberta. More farmers across the prairies are demanding marketing regulation changes.
“The ground has shifted under their feet and some of the players haven’t figured it out yet. Mr. Goodale obviously hasn’t figured it out and the wheat board hasn’t either,” Ted Allen said during the UGG’s annual meeting in Calgary.
Allen said farmers are getting frustrated with the federal minister because the continental marketing issue hasn’t been resolved yet.
“Clearly on the marketing issue his whole agenda is delay, delay, delay,” said Allen.
Doug Johnson of Hanna told Hehn the latest board “excuse” against dual marketing – that the board needs a guaranteed supply – is “very lame.
“I feel your contracting program will more than solve that.”
Hehn said a dual marketing system could be made to work if the world wheat and barley market operated in a “truly free and unfettered marketplace.”
Hehn said farmers’ criticisms of the board’s marketing are unfair, especially considering that agents were able to sell a lot of feed-grade quality wheat in a tough market in the last two years.
“I think we did a pretty fair job considering the kind of subsidy intervention we faced in the marketplace.”
