A former president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture has been appointed head of an organization dedicated to increasing farmer profitability.
Bob Friesen, who held the top job at the CFA for nearly 10 years, is chief executive officer of Farmers of North America Strategic Agriculture Institute (FNA-Stag).
Friesen said his organization will have a different focus than FNA.
“FNA is primarily focused on providing products and programs to farmers to improve farm profitability,” he said in an interview last week.
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“FNA-Stag will be looking at farm policies and regulations that directly impact farm profitability and coming up with ways to deal with that.”
For example, he said generic product registration regulations directly affect farm profits, as does the cost of moving grain by rail.
Friesen said it’s all about empowering farmers and working collectively to take control of costs.
“Margin is being taken from farmers everywhere they turn because the industry knows when a farmer works alone he is a price taker. We have to turn that around.”
He said in a news release that companies selling products to farmers try to maximize profits by pricing at the highest level they think farmers will pay.
When FNA enters the market, those other players respond by lowering their prices.
”Farmers can change the marketplace when they work together,” he said.
FNA-Stag will also get involved in research projects, perhaps with other like-minded organizations, to focus on the goal of helping farmers maximize their profits.
Friesen said Stag’s first task is to set up a board of directors that will include FNA members. They will serve two-year terms, after which Stag hopes to have in place a process to elect directors.
There will be no direct farmer membership in Stag, but Friesen said it will consider FNA members to be its constituents.
FNA-Stag was incorporated as a non-profit organization in March 2008 but has been inactive until now.
