In the ongoing saga of the Canadian Wheat Board future, which seems to grow more contentious, chaotic and sensational each day, the past week may have set a new standard.
A number of industry officials say the level of turmoil surrounding the marketing agency is bound to cost farmers money by disrupting the board’s ability to carry on the business of selling grain.
Over the course of three working days, beginning Nov. 28, the following events rocked the grain industry:
- CWB president and chief executive officer Adrian Measner was told by CWB minister Chuck Strahl that he will in all likelihood be fired within two weeks for refusing to agree with the government’s plan to end the board’s single desk authority.
- The CWB board of directors sent a letter of protest to Strahl, praising Measner’s job performance, urging the minister to reconsider his decision and asking for a meeting to discuss the issue.
- Strahl appointed a new director to the board in the person of Glen Findlay, former Manitoba agriculture minister and a strong supporter of the open market.
- The CWB filed an application in federal court asking for a judicial review of the government’s gag order that prohibits the board from spending funds to advocate for retention of the single desk. The board argues the order is unlawful, improperly vague, a contravention of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and beyond the government’s jurisdiction.
- That led to cancellation of a Dec. 5 meeting of the House of Common’s agriculture committee at which senior CWB officials were to appear.
- Liberal agriculture critic Wayne Easter denounced the cancellation, saying it was another Conservative attempt to kill the wheat board debate.
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“However they justify it, it is an attempt to stifle the wheat board from getting its opinion out. We could have gotten around the court case by not asking about the gag order.”
Easter said Strahl is “being an idiot” in his handling of the CWB issue, and the opposition consulted lawyers over whether the government is violating the CWB Act in some of its actions.
- In remarks prepared for presentation at the cancelled committee meeting, CWB chair Ken Ritter complained that the government has refused to have any serious discussions with the board about the agency’s future and asked the minister to meet with the CWB directors, for a “common sense” discussion about the future of the board.
- Finally, in a move not directly linked to the single desk debate, the board announced a three year, $46 million project to update and improve its supply chain, including expanding electronic communications with farmers, improving and upgrading such things as inventory management and marketing services, and reliability of supply to customers.
Several industry officials and observers expressed concern that the uncertainty enveloping the board will in the end hurt western Canadian grain farmers.
The federal government is doing farmers “a grave disservice” by interfering so directly and heavy-handedly in the wheat board’s business, governance and operations, said agricultural economist Murray Fulton of the University of Saskatchewan.
“This is just bad for business,” he said in an interview Dec. 4.
“Farmers’ returns depend without question on the board’s ability to do its job, so if indeed these actions damage the performance of the board, as I think it very likely that they will, this will hurt all farmers.”
David Rolfe, president of Keystone Agricultural Producers, agreed, saying the government’s confrontational approach could have serious financial consequences for producers.
“All the farmers of Western Canada are going to be the victims of any lost sales or loss of confidence in the CWB on the part of customers, which I suspect is already happening,” he said. “Farmers will ultimately pay the price for the actions of Mr. Strahl.”
In remarks prepared for presentation to the agriculture committee Dec. 5, Measner echoed those concerns.
“You cannot make wholesale changes to the board of directors of a corporation with $4 to $5 billion worth of sales, gut its management team and restructure the grain handling system without causing major upheavals and concern throughout the grain trade and most notably among buyers,” he said.
CWB director Rod Flaman said the loss of Measner, who is highly respected in international grain circles, and the possible loss of other top-level CWB employees in the future, will hurt the board’s ability to do its job and send a negative signal to grain markets.
“Relationships in the grain industry are built up over years, even over decades, and when customers see the Canadian wheat industry in such turmoil, they’ll get worried,” he said.
He speculated it’s not inconceivable the government may be purposely creating turmoil at the board to hamper the marketing agency’s sales performance and make it look bad to farmers.
Some farm groups that support the government’s plans to dismantle the single desk said they supported the looming dismissal of Measner, saying he had willfully violated the government’s gag order in several speeches and public comments, and should have been prepared to work with the federal government to implement its policies.
However, others felt that the firing of Measner, who was appointed by the previous government on the recommendation of the CWB board of directors and is employed and paid by farmers, was unjustified and improper.
“I think with this, the government has really crossed the line in the degree to which they’ve been interfering with the CWB,” said Fulton.
