Agriculture minister Gerry Ritz was wrong on several fronts when he recently criticized the Canadian Wheat Board’s new approach to marketing malting barley, says the CWB.
The board announced recently that it would shift its marketing program away from pooling and instead use CashPlus for most new sales during the remainder of 2008-09.
Ritz, who is also minister responsible for the CWB, told the House of Commons agriculture committee Feb. 10 he was “very concerned” by the board’s announcement.
“If the wheat board is not operating a pool, they’re going against their mandate, so I have to have that discussion with the wheat board,” he said.
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The board said the minister’s comments are off base in several ways.
First, the board’s actions with respect to malting barley are consistent with the CWB Act and are not unprecedented.
“The approach the wheat board decided to take with respect to sourcing malting barley is entirely within the dictates of the CWB Act,” said spokesperson Maureen Fitzhenry.
She said a decision to stop making purchases through a pool at some point in the crop year is common practice.
“Whenever we reach our maximum level of acceptance and it’s less than 100 percent and we don’t take any more grain because we’ve filled our needs, that’s the same kind of thing,” she said. “That happens most years with malting barley and durum wheat.”
Second, the CWB Act makes no reference to a mandate, so the board really has no official, legally prescribed mandate to violate.
Fitzhenry said that within the organization, the common understanding is that the agency’s mandate is to operate a single desk.
It’s often stated that the board’s mandate is to earn the highest possible return for farmers and that is outlined in its vision statement: “To extract the highest possible returns for farmers by effectively leveraging the powers of the single desk.”
As well, the board added that although it intends to focus on CashPlus for new sales, the pool remains open and the board continues to do a small amount of business through it.
Fitzhenry said the board’s shift to CashPlus was a business decision designed to obtain the best overall return for producers.
“That’s our job and that’s what we’re trying to do here.”
She said there probably won’t be much more malting barley sourced from farmers this year anyway. While those who do make some sales through CashPlus won’t get the same return as those in the pool, they will still receive a significant premium over the feed market.
“We think the steps we’ve taken represent the best solution for the most producers, given the unique market situation.”
She added it’s ironic that critics who say the board’s new approach denies equal treatment for all producers are the same people who support an open market, which would produce exactly that result.
