A commodity group leader shouldn’t be lobbying for orderly grain marketing, says the vice-president of the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association.
“You take the Saskatchewan Wheat Commission. The chair is sitting at a Friends of the Wheat Board meeting with 50 farmers voting unanimously to bring the (Canadian) Wheat Board back … and publicly being a spokesperson for them,” said Stephen Vandervalk.
“To me he’s really stepping out…. Even if you’re a wheat board supporter in Saskatchewan, you should say, ‘listen chairman, this isn’t smart for the organization.’ ”
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Vandervalk said campaigning for the return of the CWB is dangerous because a sizeable percentage of Saskatchewan wheat growers may support the open marketing system. At some point, disgruntled levy payers may demand a refund.
“(Then) all of a sudden you lose three-quarters of your funding. Even if you’re a wheat board supporter, that’s not very smart.”
SaskWheat chair Bill Gehl said the province’s farmers aren’t voicing their displeasure with the commission and its leadership.
“I have not received any phone calls. To my knowledge, the office hasn’t.”
Gehl, who farms near Regina, did attend a Canadian Wheat Board Alliance meeting this spring in Raymore, Sask., where 40 farmers passed a resolution calling for the return of “orderly marketing of grain in Western Canada.”
He said SaskWheat has a responsibility to advocate for its levy payers, who say they have lost billions in farm income since the federal government removed the CWB monopoly for marketing wheat and barley in 2012.
“Our job, as a recipient of farmers’ dollars, is to do what’s best for their bottom line…. I want to make sure that SaskWheat is in the forefront of that fight, to fight for farmers’ incomes,” he said in an interview at the Canadian Global Crops Symposium in Winnipeg.
“The majority of the work we do is around research … but we can’t forget about what’s happened over the last few years, and we’ve got to try and make things better.”
Gehl is a former chair of the Canadian Wheat Board Alliance, so Saskatchewan farmers shouldn’t be surprised by his viewpoint.
Producers may oppose his position on the CWB, but they didn’t vote him down in SaskWheat director elections.
“As a minority, they have their chance to cast their ballot in an election,” he said.
“We’ve had two elections…. I don’t think there are any big secrets about where people stand on issues.”
