Ontario wheat board directors last week endorsed an earlier delegate decision to allow farmers the right to opt out of the pool next year.
In late autumn, farmers will be asked if they want to be totally in the revenue-sharing pool for domestic and export sales in 1999, or totally out of the pool and able to sell only into the export market.
They will be offered that choice every year.
“I don’t think this is the demise of our board,” said Ken Nixon, chair of the Ontario Wheat Producers’ Marketing Board. “It’s going to let some steam off. It will let some people see the other side of the fence and make a decision on whether they want to stay in the co-op or not.”
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Typically, the Ontario board exports 60 percent of its average 1.1 million tonne crop of mainly soft white winter wheat.
“I feel in the long run, the Ontario wheat board will continue to market the majority of the grain,” Nixon said from his southern Ontario farm.
In early March, after years of agitation by some people to break the Ontario board’s export monopoly, delegates to the board’s annual meeting voted 90-10 to allow an export opt out.
Nixon said the board of directors felt it had little choice but to follow the strong will of the delegates.
“We are a marketing co-operative,” he said. “If you are going to operate a co-operative and try to force people to take part who don’t want to be there, it is a tough road.”
Prairie critics of the Canadian Wheat Board have jumped on the Ontario export opt-out policy as a precedent for the Prairies. How can western wheat farmers be denied the same marketing freedoms given Ontario farmers, they angrily asked during Senate agriculture committee hearings in late March and early April.
But Nixon said he does not want to be drawn into that debate. The legislation, the structure of the two wheat boards and the legislative base are different.
“Because something works in one place doesn’t necessarily mean it will or will not work in another place,” he said.
Now that the political decision has been made, the Ontario board must figure out how it can be implemented. It will complicate negotiations with the federal government over next year’s initial price guarantee, “but I’m confident we can do it.”
It will require discussions with elevators and millers in Ontario to make sure the rules for the dual export market are clear and that the mills are guaranteed the supplies they need.
And a clear decision must be made on the issue of whether “export” means outside Canada or just outside Ontario. If the latter, it would allow opting out farmers to sell to mills in Montreal.
Nixon said be believes “export” will mean outside Canada.
He said the Ontario wheat board will continue to collect a $1 per tonne checkoff, even for grain from growers who have opted out. The money is used for administration, research and promotion.
In return for the checkoff, he said the Ontario board likely will continue to arrange the Canadian Wheat Board export permit each farmer will need to move his grain across the border.
