Easter plenty
I could not help but notice the picture of the Liberal agriculture critic, Wayne Easter, on two of the first (five) pages of your Feb. 22 publication.
Is this the same recycled Easter who, along with his Liberal cohort, (Ralph) Goodale, were the architects for all the problems in western agriculture today from the CWB to grain transportation from past Liberal governments?
Also was not the Liberal leader, Stephane Dion, a cabinet member in both the scandal-plagued Chrétien/Martin governments? I presume he knew nothing then, as he knows nothing today?
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It is just like the Liberals to have a representative from the heavily subsidized province of Prince Edward Island speaking for westerners Or is he?
Prince Edward Island is not even half the size of Vancouver Island but obviously with more influence in Canadian politics than most western provinces.
Only in Canada you say? Pity.
The Liberal Party of Canada today remains rotten to the core and that core centres in Eastern Canada. The rape of the West is continued under the Liberal administration.
– George Powell,
Port Coquitlam, B.C.
Merging mergers
Every few months there is another merger. It is happening in every industry and the grain industry is no exception.
Alberta and Manitoba Pools merged. UGG and ADM merged and they in turn merged with the already merged pools. Pioneer Grain and Saskatchewan Wheat Pool now want to merge with the above merged-merged merger. I wonder where all of it will end?
The chief executive officers who propose these mergers say they have to merge in order to compete. The truth is they want to buy out the competition so they do not have to compete.
While all of this merging is happening, (federal agriculture) minister (Chuck) Strahl in his wisdom has decided that the farmers must unmerge. He calls it choice, but that’s code for unmerge.
When he eliminates the Canadian Wheat Board single desk, the farmers will be unmerged and competing against each other.
How can minister Strahl and his friends justify unmerging the farmers while all industries throughout the world are doing the opposite?
– B. Woods,
Eston, Sask.
Algerian issue
Contrary to Barry Wilson’s assertion (Opinion, March 8), there is no shame in questioning whether the file on Algerian wheat prices is actually closed.
His misrepresentation of our position was not surprising, however, since he made no effort to speak to either Ted Menzies or myself to inquire of the reasons for our skepticism.
The tempest over CWB wheat sales to Algeria was not started by (federal agriculture minister Chuck) Strahl or any other Conservative Member of Parliament. It was initiated by comments made by Mohamed Kacem, the Director General of the Algerian importing agency, in an interview with an Algerian newspaper.
In the CWB’s translation of the article, Mr. Kacem is quoted saying, “…our country receives preferential prices, which save Algeria tens of dollars per tonne purchased.”ÂÂ
The article goes on to say that, “In addition, the Canadian supplier pays the loading costs, and facilitations are offered with regard to the method of payment. ‘No other country offers us these advantages,’ says Kacem.”
There is no ambiguity in Mr. Kacem’s comments, which are contained in the CWB-approved translation on the CWB’s website. The head of the wheat importing agency of Algeria believes that Algeria receives a special deal from the CWB which cannot be matched by other exporters and saves them “tens of dollars per tonne purchased.”
If, as Mr. Arason has been told, the CWB’s numbers do not reflect this savings, it only compounds the questions rather than clearing them up.
– David Anderson,
MP and Parliamentary Secretary for the Canadian Wheat Board,
Ottawa, Ont.
Reap benefits
I read an interesting article in the Feb. 22 edition of the Western Producer on page four. The heading was “Petroleum sector wary of biofuel”….
In the article, it is stated that some of the world’s largest energy companies feel there is no viable business proposition for them in ethanol production.
The vice-president of Canadian Petroleum Products Institute agrees and says that unless the government forces them to blend grain-based ethanol into their fuel supply, that oil companies wouldn’t touch it.
They profess to worry about grain being stolen out of the food chain. Well, it doesn’t seem that anyone was interested in paying more for grain to provide food or to lower the price of their fuel to farmers to grow it.
He also stated that the government mandate shouldn’t be that ethanol is blended into every litre of gas or diesel sold. He suggests 10 percent in metropolitan areas and zero percent in remote areas.
He says that way you don’t have to worry about infrastructure as you do up into the corners of “Spruce and Goose at No-Where-Land, Sask.”
Who does he think he is? The ignorant and rude ideas that people have of Saskatchewan appalls me. We grow the grain here and should have some of the needed production facilities built here.
If our great NDP government would get off their butts and be ready for these opportunities, this province might prosper and not be called No-Where-Land.
Ten percent ethanol should be added equally to all fuel for all people and especially farmers who grow the needed product.
But isn’t it always the same? The big gas and oil companies have made us pay dearly for fuel. Are they afraid the producer might finally get some of the benefit?…
– Bernie Tiringer,
Spiritwood, Sask.
Further clarification
In response to Mr. John De Pape’s comments under the heading “Story clarification” (Open Forum, March 1), I would like to make a few comments.
Mr. De Pape said I could not argue against his points; otherwise I would have. The fact is, to argue in the setting of a Frontier Centre breakfast meeting with only 30 people, most of whom have set their minds in spite of the facts, would have been basically useless.
In fact, I was not allowed to make any comments during Mr. De Pape’s talk because it was being videotaped. Ed White commented on my frustration after the presentation.
When the Sparks paper, which Mr. De Pape references, was released two years ago, CWB economists reviewed it and found it to be fundamentally flawed with erroneous assumptions and conclusions.
This review was completed by economists, including myself, at the CWB. It should also be noted that the Alberta government funded this study and to my knowledge, it has never been officially critiqued by impartial agricultural economists nor has it been published in any professional journals. I think we know why.
– Bob Cuthbert,
Canadian Wheat Board,
Winnipeg, Man.
Keep CWB
The Canadian Wheat Board should not be destroyed. I am in my 80s and can remember what it was like before the CWB was formed. My parents were short of money so had to sell their grain as soon as it was threshed in the fall and received a very low price and no final payment.
Farmers that could hold their grain until the next summer received a much higher price.
After the CWB was formed, quotas were issued, which were fair to all grain producers. The farmers hauled their grain to elevators and received an initial payment.
Then after the crop year ended July 31, they received a final payment giving them the average during that crop year. What could be more fair than that?
Grain growers that want the open market are playing right into the hands of the big companies that are hoping the CWB will be destroyed so they can make a huge profit at the farmers’ expense.
If we were still able to farm, all our grain would be sold through the CWB.
– R. A. Johnson,
Mayerthorpe, Alta.
Sold out
Could somebody please tell me why they called it dictatorship when Hitler and Germany tried to take over the world in World War II and now call it democracy when George Bush and the United States seem to be doing the same thing?
I understand they already control over 50 percent of our economy. How long before we become just another state in the U.S.?
Prime minister John Diefenbaker sold us out to the Americans when he shot down the Avro aircraft industry.
Prime minister Brian Mulroney sold us out on the free trade deal.
What else beside the softwood lumber deal is prime minister (Stephen) Harper going to give away? Will we ever learn?
– Cliff Wunder,
Sheho, Sask.
Water worries
Clay Serby has been quoted as saying there will be a dam on the North Saskatchewan River near Highgate.
I find it ironic that the fate of our river is to be decided by people who have never walked along it or canoed a portion of it.
It is (more than) a year since some of us found that there was a meeting on in North Battleford regarding the dam, so we hurried off to attend. We found that it was $50 each to get in. That would deter some people to whom that is still quite a lot of money….
Anyone who spoke out against the proposed dam was not well received. As one questioner said: “It was just a boosterism meeting.” There was no one to answer questions about the possibility of small dams, to tell us what was to be done about bridges, roads, homes, pipelines, fish and wildlife, or the ins and outs of irrigation on hilly land….
There are organizations which carry on about climate change and drought, claiming that the solution is to build more dams, but then they encourage “economic development” of a type which will use more and more water. …
Can you tell us, Mr. Serby, what you know about the so-called “drought proofing Saskatchewan” plan? What do you know about plans to drain all our rivers into a southern route, stealing water from the north until “Oops! Who made that ditch going across our southern border?”
Can you tell us anything about the number that band chiefs have been paid to say they are in favour of a dam on the North Saskatchewan River?
What about the story that the Highgate dam might be built by private interests? How would they manage the water?
I would like you to listen to us and not just to loud-mouthed people who have even bragged about going roughshod over others to get their own way. I’m tired of big business or government sticking a pin in the map for development, saying more or less “it’s for your own good.”…
We need economic development but not at the expense of the environment. It doesn’t take long to be in a lifestyle from which people are fleeing either, because of the ugliness of overdevelopment.
Saskatchewanians should ask questions. Don’t just shrug and say it won’t happen.
On the other hand, be wary of bandwagons which seem attractive just because they’re big and noisy, and because you’re saying, “we have to have water.”
Be wary of the claim we can defeat the drought cycle. Read up on the dams of the world. Read about how a river works.
We just cannot “start to conserve water” by using more and more of it….
– C. Pike,
Waseca, Sask.
Track record
With the ongoing discussion the federal government has about the Canadian Wheat Board, one might ask the question, who is on the farmer’s side?
It seems the federal government believes there is one farm organization that gives good advice. Let us look at its track record.
During the Crow debate, this organization sided with government. We got a compensation package of $1.2 billion to cover the all-time loss from losing the rail network we had.
Compare that number to the current annual rail charge for moving oilseed, pulse crops and cereal to market, plus the annual trucking costs to get them to the elevator or processing plant. Then add the cost of fixing the pounded out roads we complain about.
Did we get hosed?…
You might remember the bad winter of 1996. The railways had a hard time getting through the mountains. They decided they would rather move things other than wheat. To force the railways to move our wheat, the CWB filed a loss of service complaint on our behalf. It took a three-week court case, but when the railways saw they were going to lose, they reached a negotiated settlement. Guess who sided with the railways during the court case? Our government’s favourite farm organization….
This list could go on and on and on. One does wonder how many times this organization can promote ideas that have cost or would have cost its members and all farmers millions, more like billions of dollars, if it had its way, and still be considered expert, able to give good advice to government.
– Lorne Jackson,
Riverhurst, Sask.
Cattle & CAIS
Producers deserve better.
I felt compelled to respond to your article titled, “Sask. benefits most from CAIS program” (WP, Nov. 16). You quote Danny Foster, director general of business risk management programs, as suggesting the mandatory usage of accrual accounting in the historical margin will benefit participants, as it should increase average CAIS (Canadian Agricultural Income Stabilization) margins.
Mr. Foster further suggests that the cattle sector will be the second major beneficiary of the $900 million CITI program. I believe both of these suggestions to be erroneous and misleading.
Consider this: federal/provincial governments just recently amended CAIS to allow for additional negative margin coverage. Originally you were allowed negative margin coverage in only two out of five years. Farm groups fought hard to have this changed, as many producers have experienced consecutive negative margins.
With consecutive years of drought through the Prairies, followed by unprecedented flooding (in Manitoba), topped off by the crippling effects of BSE, which we are still feeling, and it is of little surprise to anyone tied to the agriculture sector that multiple negative margins have occurred.
Under the proposed change coming for 2007, these negative margins would now be locked into your historical margin calculation. I fail to see how these margins are going to miraculously recover and improve, just by switching to accrual accounting.
I suspect Mr. (Wayne) Easter’s contention that the opposite will occur is closer to reality.
Also consider this: producers already had a choice to utilize the accrual accounting method via the modified accrual accounting option schedules, therefore this change was unnecessary. These schedules added any net increase or decrease in inventory value into the reference years, after which, both the structure change and Olympic average option were applied. …
The second factor working against producers is their own actions during BSE. Faced with severely depressed prices, most producers opted to retain their feeder calves and hold back everything they could. …
Once again, it will mean little if any benefit going to the primary producer. On the surface, a program that has been billed to benefit the cattle sector as a whole will, in all likelihood, go solely to the feedlot industry, and ultimately to the major packing plants in this country who have direct ties to the feedlot industry. Producers have a right to know the facts. Producers deserve better than this.
– Robert Vosters,
Marquette, Man.
Two on block
As if in response to a nod from an orchestra director, the letters to the editor are again busy with their usual denunciation of the Canadian Wheat Board.
Soon I expect we will see a farmer taking a load to the U.S. border and making a scene when turned back for the benefit of the media. Then the spokesperson for the supporting demonstrators will again step forward and retell the story about how this board infringes on one’s freedom of choice on how to sell their grain.
There will be no mention that this board is composed of directors, the majority of which are elected by the farmers.
But as we hear of all this board affair in the daily news, something else just as critical is going down.
The Saskatchewan Wheat Pool, the largest grain buyer in Canada, is now attempting to conduct a hostile takeover of Agricore United. If they are successful, they will have total and complete monopoly of more than 75 percent of all grain handling and transport access in Canada.
This is no longer a co-operative with elected committees and conventions. It’s now a for-profit organization in a no-holds-barred wrestle for total supremacy.
That they have an outstanding shortfall matter concerning their contribution to their own employees pension fund won’t stop them from waving money at Agricore, for example.
If they succeed, they will then try to be bigger on the West Coast and then someone else shall set out to buy them, likely foreign this time.
What choice does this leave a farmer in his own backyard?
It seems to me that any farmer, whether or not he or she had reservations about the wheat board, would in present circumstances be fighting like hell to keep at least two kids on the block. …
– Wes Norheim,
Regina, Sask.
Bus costs
Lights flashing, the yellow bus drops its young charges at the school, then pulls away from the curb.
Most days, the driver would return home to do her housework, or outdoor chores.
Today, however, is the day her bus is scheduled for its regular servicing. For many years, this meant just a short drive across town to the school board bus garage. There, the competent mechanic would change the oil and filter, grease all relevant parts, and other maintenance work as required.
The total cost to the taxpayer was probably not much more than an oil change on the family car.
Things are different today. The local school board garage is closed, a victim of the modern day philosophy of “bigger is better.”
Today, instead of four or five blocks, our driver must now wheel her bus 50 or 60 miles to the city.
There it will be serviced by the same competent mechanic who has done the job for years. But now he must also drive 50 or 60 miles to his place of work.
How much is this “bigger is better” costing taxpayers, city residents included? About half a day of the driver’s time. In terms of extra fuel, at eight miles to the gallon, figure about 15 gallons at $5 comes to $75.
It will require the same amount of oil and filters, regardless of where the job is done. Wear and tear on the vehicle will cost approximately the same as the fuel. The cost in dollars and cents becomes astronomical.
To that we must add the environmental damage caused by burning all that extra fuel, plus the wear and tear on our highway system. Multiply this by the unknown number of buses in the province similarly affected, and the question becomes, is this sustainable?
– Gerry Laughren,
Krydor, Sask.
Pollution issues
We hear much about pollution. Some pollution results because of thoughtlessness while the worst is subtly planned….
A deliberate cause of pollution is promoted by some wildlife groups which is sanctioned by deceived or corrupt governments which despise primary producers by protecting ducks, deer, geese and seals.
If that were not so, they would accept the translated Russian proverb, “the beautiful becomes repulsive when it causes loss” and so demand such wildlife groups to adequately compensate such victims to adequately cover their losses or action be taken to reduce such wildlife to levels where such wildlife won’t abuse primary producers. …
– Stuart Makaroff,
Saskatoon, Sask.
