Pasta file
Re: CWB mishandled Prairie Pasta file, editorial of July 15.
I would like to take this opportunity to respond to your editorial of July 15. It alleges the Canadian Wheat Board is placing roadblocks before groups such as the Prairie Pasta Producers as they attempt to provide greater value-added opportunities for western Canadian farmers.
In fact, the CWB is willing to work with groups such as PPP for the advantage of farmers. The recent decisions of our farmer-controlled board clearly reflect that willingness.
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Worrisome drop in grain prices
Prices had been softening for most of the previous month, but heading into the Labour Day long weekend, the price drops were startling.
For example, we have provided exporter status to PPP, subject to completion of necessary financial arrangements. The group will be an exporter of Canadian grain as soon as it secures a letter of credit to cover the value of the grain – a standard industry procedure to ensure payment to farmers making deliveries.
The PPP situation is a complex one, especially since the group is partnering with a U.S. company and production will occur in a facility located in the U.S. Here are some key points your readers should be aware of:
- The CWB’s new generation co-operative policy applies to farmer-owned entities which process grain in Canada. A valuable component of the NGC policy is stock switching. This policy enhances the ability of NGC proponents to raise the necessary capital to start up a value-added processing business.
- Farmers investing and taking an equity position in NGCs can deliver as per the CWB policy defined in 2001. PPP does not qualify as an NGC, therefore this policy does not apply.
- While the PPP considers itself a NGC, the group does not qualify under the policy because of its relationship with Dakota Growers Pasta, which is an American corporate entity that processes U.S. durum.
- PPP wants to sell shares to farmers in Canada, and the marketability of those shares is dependent on having unrestricted delivery opportunity. Meanwhile all other farmers are subject to CWB contract calls.
Essentially the group is attempting to sell the right to deliver outside the CWB to a processor located in the U.S.
- The CWB clarified in writing to PPP on March 19, 2001 that deliveries to the U.S. would be subject to CWB contract acceptance levels. PPP never questioned the CWB at that time but has waited until now to raise this issue.
- The pasta produced at this plant will be exported to Canada, where it will displace pasta produced by domestic manufacturers who are using 100 percent Canadian durum.
The Canadian Wheat Board and its farmer-controlled board of directors remain committed to working with all groups promoting the economic well-being of western Canadian farmers. I trust this information will be valuable to your readers.
– Ken Ritter,
Chair, CWB board of directors,
Winnipeg, Man.
Choice nonsense
Alberta agriculture minister Shirley McClellan and the Alberta government want to develop a grain marketing system that is based on myths and lies. The Alberta government’s “Choice Matters” advertising campaign is complete nonsense.
Farmers already have choices in grain marketing:
The open domestic feed grain market for barley and wheat in Western Canada is a choice.
The fixed price contract is a choice. Farmers have the option of fixing the price through the Canadian Wheat Board or on a price with open market barley, wheat or specialty crops.
Farmers can do direct sales contracts through the CWB.
They can quit growing grain for the export and human consumption markets that are under single desk.
These are all choices farmers have now.
Farmers are smart business people, and they make smart choices. This is why in three consecutive CWB elections in Alberta, they chose to vote in directors who favour single desk selling. …
Ms. McClellan and her colleagues in the Alberta government don’t want marketing choice, they want a deregulated open market. The Alberta government’s choice is deregulation, and that is what this expensive propaganda campaign is all about….
The Alberta government pushed the federal Mulroney Progressive Conservatives to deregulate the grain handling and transportation system. A bad choice. Deregulation has cost farmers one-third of their grain revenue for handling and transportation.
The myth the PCs spread was that we would keep our feed grain at home, expand our livestock industry and barley would be $5 a bushel. It was a lie. The market is flooded with CPS wheat and if the price starts to rise, or if there is a shortage, subsidized U.S. corn is imported.
The Alberta government pushed for a continental barley market. They kept barley out of the CWB for a time. A bad choice. In three months, barley prices dropped by one-third. After 90 days, it was reinstated to the CWB and quickly bounced back to its previous price.
The Alberta government deregulated the hog industry… A bad choice. The Alberta hog industry is a disaster for farmers under the open market. Only for 18 months in the past five years have hog farmers had profitable returns for slaughter hogs….
Ms. McClellan and the Alberta government have failed to speak clearly for the interest of Alberta farmers and ranchers.
The real problem is that their faulty beliefs and policies are creating the crisis. Further deregulation of the CWB would prove to be as wrong as the previous bad choices …
– Dale Fankhanel,
Ferrintosh, Alta.
Animal welfare
This letter is in response to the article, “Farmers wary of animal rights coalition” in the Aug. 12 issue of the Western Producer.
The article speaks of providing “an entre for animal welfare groups like humane societies to become involved in setting rules for how farmers must behave.”
That statement is just so flawed I hardly know where to begin.
The title names “animal rights” and the body of the story “animal welfare.”
Why do so many people persist in believing they are the same thing? They are apples and oranges. I resent the way humane societies are forever being lumped in with animal rights groups.
As a founding member and current president of a humane society, I can assure you they are not the same thing.
I personally don’t even know who the Canadian Animal Health Coalition is, and in fact, until reading the article, had never even heard of them before. I do have this to say about them – if they are, in fact, an animal rights group, which isn’t clear either, then their name is misleading.
Again, “animal health” and “animal rights” are not the same thing.
However, I believe it is common for animal rights groups to cloak their purpose under innocuous-sounding names. Be that as it may, I’m betting they’re not a humane society.
People who believe in animal welfare simply want all animals, pets or livestock, in a home or in a feedlot, treated humanely, the definition of “humane” meaning in this context, with mercy and kindness. In other words, free from hunger, unnecessary pain and stress.
It doesn’t mean we think you should not eat meat or hunt or wear fur. If you kill it, kill it quickly and painlessly. When you raise it, raise it right.
As almost all livestock producers know, you can’t abuse or neglect an animal and expect it to produce for you. It has nothing to do with animal rights, a concept I personally do not even understand, much less support.
Let me tell you what humane societies do: we take in stray, abandoned and unwanted companion animals and try to find them homes.
We spend countless hours fundraising. We care for, feed, clean up after, hopefully adopt out and unfortunately also euthanize, cats and dogs.
We try to educate the public and talk until we’re blue in the face about overpopulation and the importance of spaying and neutering. We do not have the time, the energy or the inclination to tell farmers how to raise their livestock
If you doubt my words, then let me tell you that I am a livestock producer myself, raising sheep for meat and replacements. I dock tails, I castrate, I ear tag. No animal rights activist is going to tell me that I am doing anything wrong. The proof is out in the pasture.
– Lorri Nelson, President
Meadow Lake and District Humane Society
Meadow Lake, Sask.
