SASKATOON – At least one new voice will be heard when the newly-elected Canadian Wheat Board advisory committee holds its first meeting.
Since 1975, farmers in District 6 have been represented by Roy Atkinson, the former president of the National Farmers Union and outspoken defender of the wheat board marketing system.
But Atkinson chose not to run again, leaving two new candidates to fight it out for the hearts and minds – or at least the votes – of the district’s 10,822 permit book holders.
While there will definitely be a new voice at the committee table, the voters will determine whether the song will remain the same.
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If Bill Rosher wins, the answer is yes. He’s pledging to carry on in the tradition established by Atkinson, who has endorsed his candidacy and accompanied him on some campaign appearances in the district.
The 36-year-old farmer from Smiley, Sask., is telling voters he believes in a strong wheat board, rejects dual marketing and wants to expand the marketing agency’s mandate to include other grains: “Hopefully that will differentiate me from my opponent,” he said in an interview.
That opponent is Art Walde, a 60-year-old farmer from the Kindersley area. He says he supports many aspects of the wheat board, but also thinks the agency has made “major blunders” in recent years and changes are needed.
“I think in our district the issues are clear,” said Walde. “Mr. Rosher stands for the status quo, even a hardening of the wheat board. I stand for more liberalization and allowing different things to happen.”
Some of the things Walde wants, like a more efficient and dependable handling and transportation system, aren’t under the direct control of the wheat board, a fact he freely admits. But he thinks the board should do more to pressure the industry and other government agencies to make the needed changes.
While Walde supports phasing in a “limited dual market”, starting perhaps with barley to the U.S., he rejects being labelled as anti-wheat board.
He says he supports central selling and price pooling, but doesn’t like the compulsory nature of the board’s export monopoly.
Rosher rejects dual marketing, saying the board would become a buyer of last resort if individual farmers could cherry-pick the premium U.S. market. He found very little support for the idea during a recent tour of the district.
“I ran into one guy who said that it would be nice, if the border was right next door, to maybe drop a load of wheat in there, but other than that I’ve found very little opposition to the board as it stands now,” he said.
Rosher sees the election as a referendum on whether the board should retain its monopoly over wheat and barley. And he doesn’t think there’s any place on the committee for people who want to undermine that monopoly.
“If they don’t believe in the wheat board, then I don’t think the way to change it is to get onto a committee that is supposed to advise the board.”
Walde disagrees, saying there’s no reason farmers who are sometimes critical of the board shouldn’t be on the committee.
Both candidates say they want to bring more demo-cracy to the board’s operations, although they have different goals in mind.
Rosher wants a mechanism in place to allow farmers to vote on adding or removing grains from the wheat board.
Walde wants the board’s five commissioners to be elected by farmers, rather than appointed by the federal government.
