Milton Boyd (WP op-ed, Aug. 18) says the grain industry will prosper post monopoly. That is an understatement when you figure the losses to rural communities, all going into the grain industry’s pockets. It doesn’t mean the farmers or communities will benefit. The grain industry will be back in the driver’s seat – as they were prior to the wheat board. The grain industry profited immensely during the Depression and will always profit because people have to eat. The question is, once the wheat board is gone, how does the farmer profit?
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It will be like Australia without its wheat board with no market for small farmers. The result is there is no more medium to small farmers. If you can’t fill a shipload, you don’t have a market, so farms have had to expand. A 10,000 acre farm will no longer cut it in this new world global system we will bring about without the Canadian Wheat Board.
In the same issue, Chris Selness’ statement (in his letter to the editor) that all large farmers wish the end of the CWB and are clamouring for their right to make their own decisions, is wrong. When I attended the pro-wheat board rallies, a lot of these people were large farmers and were younger in age.
He says the wheat board is antiquated. Here he is wrong again. The wheat board is a modern, advanced concept our ancestors could only dream about. What the corporations are doing is bringing back the old antiquated open market they once owned prior to the wheat board where farmers lost possession of their property when they had to sign contracts prior to seeding.
This is called decoupling farmers from the market. They will have it back once the wheat board is gone -be careful of what you wish for.
R.E. Kennedy,Simpson, Sask.
