Propaganda?
Larry Hill’s Aug. 21 letter is a great example of Canadian Wheat Board propaganda.
He boasts how western farmers will receive over $7 billion from grain marketed through the CWB in 2007-08. Hill would like farmers to believe that this is thanks to the CWB.
However, it was due to higher world prices, something the CWB had nothing to do with.
He says these higher returns include revenue due to CWB pooling. He says this “extra $560 million was calculated by comparing the spring wheat and durum pool returns with the U.S. weighted average farmer monthly receipts, published by the United States Department of Agriculture.”
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But there’s a lot he didn’t say. Did he mention that USDA data covers the U.S. crop year beginning in June? And that the data is incomplete since the crop year wasn’t over when the CWB did its comparison? No, he did not.
Not only does this data cover a period inconsistent with the CWB pool period and the Canadian crop year, it doesn’t even cover the complete crop year.
Did he mention that the CWB is comparing the pool return for number one CWRS 13.5 percent with USDA data that includes prices for lower grades, which of course will have lower prices? No he did not.
Mr. Hill also states that “a disciplined pooled approach to marketing … resulted in significant benefits for producers.”
Did he happen to say how the pool return compares to the average CWB selling price quotes for the year? No, he did not.
The final PRO is almost $2.72 per bushel below the crop year average of the CWB’s spring wheat selling prices and $6.10 per bu. below the crop year average CWB durum selling price.
The final PRO is roughly the same as the CWB’s average selling price at harvest time in September. So, through the best efforts of the CWB, western Canadian wheat farmers ended up with harvest time prices.
Using the CWB’s preliminary indication of 2007-08 pool size, western Canadian farmers received $2.1 billion less for their wheat and durum than just average-price returns would have provided.
I question Mr. Hill’s choice of words. This is clearly “significant” but I fail to see any “benefit.”…
The CWB must stop the propaganda and simply tell it like it is. But maybe if they did, CWB marketing performance wouldn’t look good, and that explains the propaganda.
But it doesn’t excuse it.
– Carol Husband,
Wawota, Sask.
Flag thoughts
I got a phone call from a guy from Alberta who enjoys reading letters in the Western Producer’s Open Forum.
After a lengthy discussion revolving around western alienation, we came to the conclusion that the (Lester B.) Pearson Liberals and the introduction of the new flag was one of the turning points in western Canadian patriotism.
The students at Gravelbourg High School were standing in a fresh coat of ankle high snow on Feb. 15, 1965, when the new flag was raised above the flat plains.
When one is 15 years of age and relatively innocent, a new flag is exciting. We sang O Canada, and never thought for a moment that the new flag was indeed a photo copy of the logo of the Liberal Party of Canada.
Nor did we realize that the main symbol on the flag, the leaf of the sugar maple, represented a tree that didn’t grow west of Ontario. What we refer to as a Manitoba maple in the prairie west is indeed a box elder, also known as an American maple.
There were some protests to the Liberal government in Ottawa asking that the red bars on the flag be replaced with blue.
This would have represented a nation that spanned from the Atlantic to the Pacific. It would have also been in sync with the colours of the flags of France, Britain and the United States, where the great majority of our ancestors originated.
Ottawa turned a deaf ear to our protests. To this day, Western Canada does not occupy a single thread on the flag of Canada. Perhaps someday we’ll have our flag, red white and blue, and brand new. God bless the West.
– John Hamon,
Gravelbourg, Sask.
Rail heritage
We read with interest the letters expressing opinions of our western contributors to your paper. Our concern is the preservation of some of our Canadian history, namely the rail transportation system.
Since our former government took the liberty to sell Canadian National Railway to shareholders, a large number being Americans, many rail lines have been abandoned. Recently the steel is being dismantled, leaving the environment in sad disarray.
Several ratepayers have purchased the motorized rail vehicles formerly used to do rail maintenance. Since the abandonment of the lines, they have used them to provide rides to tourists and locals, through scenic bushland to a historical dam site that was built in 1928 with horses by the Gibbs brothers of Lumsden, Sask., with the purpose of providing water for the steam locomotives.
An inquiry was made as to the possibility of leaving three miles of rail in the Amiens subdivision for the purpose of this enterprise to keep our people in touch with part of our pioneer spirit.
Tourists from a number of other countries have enjoyed experiencing this part of history.
When the land here was originally surveyed, allowances were made for roads and railways. A number of our ancestors helped build the railways.
In answer to our inquiry the price for these few miles was $200,000. Does this sound reasonable?
– Walter Isaak,
Medstead, Sask.
More busts
In June 2005, Stockwell Day stated Canada must play a G8 leadership role and commit to a timetable to spend 0.7 percent of GDP on foreign aid.
Busted: the Conservatives have since avoided a commitment.
In January 2006, Stephen Harper promised an extra $425 million on aid over five years. Delivered: largely made of previous Liberal-initiated increases.
At the same time, he promised to move Canadian aid to the average of the 22 wealthiest nations.
Busted: the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development average is about 0.45 percent while Canada’s contribution dropped from 0.30 percent to 0.28 percent last year.
Verdict: pity, but Canada’s foreign aid has had more recent busts than the TSX.
– Randy Rudolph,
Calgary, Alta.
Invalid comparison
Warnings by the world’s climate scientists are based on valid peer reviewed scientific work published in scientific journals, and thus are drawn from the best knowledge possible.
We must always demand that all scientific disciplines continually debate and re-evaluate their conclusions, and then heed their advice.
It was not valid for a writer in the Oct. 2 issue (Opinion) to compare the professional work of disciplined climate scientists with the false warning of a U.S. president regarding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
That president’s warnings were not based on published peer reviewed scientific conclusions drawn from publicly available data.
Rains falling further from the equator than civilization has relied upon during its build up of human population is a plausible result of a warming climate.
Adequate precipitation would shift north and south of the world’s best agricultural soils and be wasted on northern gravel and southern ocean, with the consequence of famine amongst the world’s big populations.
Hunger may trigger vicious wars without victory, perhaps commencing within one decade.
At Brandon, I had the privilege of witnessing military historian Gwynne Dyer’s report of the science, concluding that climate change has accelerated, and of the preparations of British and U.S. military planners who anticipate a consequent decline in global food trade, and his fear that we may fail to all act soon enough to avert widespread famines and heightened risk of war.
As farmers, it is our duty to prevent famine. We must manage the global climate as intensely and responsibly as we manage the livestock, crop and soil of Earth’s garden.
– Grant Rigby,
Killarney Lake, Man.
