Western Canadian grain handling companies weren’t at the table during Chuck Strahl’s July 27 meeting in Saskatoon aimed at devising a strategy for implementing a dual market for wheat and barley, but they weren’t completely absent either.
Two of the 25 groups attending the closed-door meeting hosted by Strahl, the federal agriculture minister, include grain handling companies among their members.
The Winnipeg Commodity Exchange membership includes all major grain firms operating in Western Canada.
And Grain Vision Inc., a fledgling grain industry lobby group that wants the board stripped of its single desk marketing authority, counts among its members the four big grain handlers along with inland terminal companies and grain processors.
Read Also
Ag in Motion innovation awards showcase top 2025 ag technology
The 2025 Ag in Motion Innovation Awards celebrated winners across five categories: agronomics, agtech, business solutions, environmental sustainability and equipment.
While Grain Vision, which plans to hold its inaugural general membership meeting this fall, isn’t ready to release a complete membership list, a document prepared in April 2005 lists Agricore United, Cargill Canada Inc. and James Richardson International Ltd. as signatories. Saskatchewan Wheat Pool has joined since that time.
Following the July 27 meeting, Strahl said a decision was made to not invite grain handling companies to the session.
He said it would have been inappropriate for companies that could potentially compete with the Canadian Wheat Board in a dual market to take part in discussions about how the wheat board would be structured and how it could conduct business as a voluntary marketing organization.
“We want to maintain a strong, profitable viable wheat board and didn’t feel the grain companies should be part of that discussion,” he said.
National Farmers Union president Stewart Wells said those comments indicate one of two things: the minister didn’t know that grain companies were represented at the meeting through Grain Vision and the WCE, or he was being disingenuous.
“Either way doesn’t reflect very well on him,” he said.
The NFU president said he doesn’t believe grain companies should have a say in the fate of the CWB’s monopoly on sales of western grown wheat, malting barley and all export barley. He said those companies stand to profit from the board’s demise and the creation of an open market.
“They are totally motivated by self-interest,” he said.
Paul Orsak, a Manitoba farmer and chair of Grain Vision, acknowledged that grain companies are an important part of Grain Vision, with representatives on the interim board of directors.
“Some of the grain companies are clearly supporters and members of Grain Vision, so to that extent you could say they were in the room,” he said.
However, he emphasized that the government asked Grain Vision to have farmers at the meeting and that’s what the organization did.
“We didn’t have any grain company people at the table,” said Orsak, himself a member of Agricore United’s board of directors.
It can be difficult to speak on behalf of an organization that includes farmers and grain companies among its members, he said, but that’s one of the reasons for Grain Vision’s existence, he added.
“Too often, for one reason or another, some people like to drive wedges between sectors of the grain business.”
Grain Vision’s approach is to look for agreement and common ground among the various stakeholders as reflected in its membership, which includes farm groups, grain handlers, processors, the WCE, grain industry consultants and non-farm business groups like the Canadian Chamber of Commerce.
GV has its origins in the fall of 2002, when like-minded groups decided to form a coalition to lobby for a more commercial, competitive, deregulated agriculture industry that would be open to new investment, new technology and wealth creation.
After two years as an informal coalition, about 60 to 70 people attending a meeting in Calgary last winter set up a more formal structure and this spring Grain Vision became a not-for-profit corporation.
The group plans to hold its first annual general meeting this fall to pass bylaws, formalize membership fees and elect a board of directors. Members also hope to discuss ways to pursue policy goals, including reform of the Canadian Grain Commission and Canada Grain Act, an end to single desk marketing of wheat and barley, deregulation of transportation, development of value-added and introduction of new technologies.
He said the members of Grain Vision agree on what needs to be done, so the focus will be on devising strategies and tactics to accomplish those goals rather than debating issues.
