Rail profits; Fine PM; Text messages; Alta. worries; Potash price; Healthy eating; OFA compromise
Rail profits
Kelli Svendsen, a representative of CN Rail, makes the statement in The Western Producer of April 16 that the rail line in question is to be abandoned because it is no longer viable.
The Camrose-Alliance branch line is also scheduled for abandonment. This line had the heavy steel installed on it in 1988. The federal and provincial governments funded this largely or entirely.
What a profit CN will enjoy when this line is pulled up and sold. CN has done little to maintain this line because it did not need to. In recent years it cut some trees that were near intersections to improve visibility.
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What expenses make this line unviable? There are limited capital costs and virtually no costs to maintain the line.
The federal government in its last budget is giving $60 million to the railways. Will the railways have to repay the government when they sell these lines? Farmers are trying to buy the Camrose-Alliance line. What a joy buying a railroad line twice.
The railroads made $600 and $900 million profit last year. They are not struggling for viability. They have a monopoly situation in which they charge what the traffic will bear. Freight rates on grain shipments are a negotiated process between government and the railroads.
The railroads’ move from 50 to 100 car trains is a grab for more profits, not any competitive factor in the marketplace.
– Clark Lysne,
Wetaskiwin, Alta.
Fine PM
Stephen Harper demonstrated his knowledge, his ability and his leadership at the G20 Summit in London.
Other members sought him out to learn why Canada was the last to be affected by the recession and why it is expected that Canada will be the first to recover. They wanted to know how our banking system was still free, yet was controlled by regulations. Canada has set the standard which will be copied throughout the world.
Stephen Harper rejected the idea that nations should raise barriers to free trade in order to favour national interests. He inspired all nations to participate to control the recession and he wanted all nations, including the most humble, to benefit.
Stephen Harper spoke to all Europe, explaining Canada’s role in Afghanistan promoting democracy and rule of law and our efforts to build schools and hospitals, water supplies and irrigation and he spoke of the need for support of all nations. …
Stephen Harper won the admiration of the world …. He returned home exhausted as a Canadian hero. There was no welcome by the nation. On the contrary, the Liberals had their knives out and the Liberal-biased CBC and CTV criticized his every move.
Stephen Harper did not act for political gain. He did it because he loves Canada and he loves the people of the world.
He proved himself to be a great Canadian and I am sure he will go down in history as the finest prime minister we have ever had.
– John I. Fisher,
North Battleford, Sask.
Text messages
Recently I attended one of our local businesses and found a young person text-messaging. I asked her how long a text took and how many she did in a day. When she responded, I did the math and said that she was texting about 90 minutes a day while at work. …
As I was driving down a busy street in Regina, I watched for … those text-messaging addicts who cannot go one block without a text. To my amazement, there were 15 in 10 blocks of driving.
They advise us against driving while on our cell phones but is texting not just as dangerous?
I have found that the younger generation cannot get past two sentences. Why? That’s all the text will allow you, so you become addicted to such speech mode. …
In recent weeks, an old friend and I had some time to kill before we were to attend a customer appreciation night. We stopped at a Regina nightspot to have supper and a drink.
While we sat there, we noticed that the young ladies and men were all on the sidelines, texting. Not one of them had the ability to walk up to the other sex and ask for a dance. In our day, we would have been across that floor and putting on the charm and getting a dance.
Are we killing our kids with today’s technology? Are we allowing a machine to control their minds? Are we going to end up with a society that has little or no communication skills? …
– Bob Thomas,
Regina Beach, Sask.
Alta. worries
By their actions you will know them. (The Alberta Progressive Conservative government) creates uncertainty by agreeing to increase royalties required from the oil industry, the result of which is the drilling industry moving to British Columbia and Saskatchewan.
The government is also responsible for the upgrading that was proposed for the Edmonton area not proceeding. The $60 billion that was required to accomplish this will not flow to a jurisdiction where there is no certainty of a fair return.
Then the government has imposed on the Edmonton area the greater Edmonton regional planning area, which includes the counties of Leduc, Parkland, Sturgeon, Strathcona and the towns and villages included in those boundaries.
The mayor of Edmonton has been given a veto over any decision of this group that he does not agree. This strips the locally elected officials of their ability to represent their citizens.
I would have thought that both the premier and the mayor would not so soon have forgotten the lessons of history given their ethnic backgrounds.
Then we have Bill 19, which will make it less cumbersome for the government to take ownership of private land for public purposes. It should not be necessary to remind the premier that private ownership of land is the cornerstone of democracy. …
If rural land is required for public purposes, there is a requirement that it is acquired by a fairly negotiated agreement between the landowner and government.
Contrary to what our rural elected official agreed to at the meeting of the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts and Counties with respect to Bill 19, we do not need Jack Hayden’s assurance that we will be treated fairly. I believe that our rights now guarantee this.
Here is my message to premier Stelmach and this government: democracy is cumbersome but dictatorship is not an option. …
We have clearly shown you our support in rural Alberta by our actions. We thought you were our friends. If you would prefer rural Alberta as your enemy, just keep stepping on our rights and treating us as second-class citizens.
– L. A. Kluthe,
Morinville, Alta.
Potash price
In D’Arce McMillan’s article (WP, April 30), Bill Doyle, head of Potash Corp., is struggling to understand why farmers are reducing fertilizer usage, particularly potash.
Retail price for potash has gone from $380 per tonne in the fall of 2006 to $1,000 per tonne in just over two years.
During a recession, when most business is in survival mode, the potash industry sees it as a time when nearly tripling the price of their fertilizer is appropriate and if the consumers don’t fall in line, the potash industry is prepared to reduce production and lay off workers to make their point.
How does an industry justify such massive price increases when the result is driving people out of work and curtailing production?
The cost to produce a tonne of potash fertilizer has not increased that dramatically. In fact with reductions in costs of natural gas and freight, it may have gone down.
Could greed be a factor in the pricing strategy? The potash industry had no problem generating a respectable bottom line when its product retailed for under $500 per tonne.
Someone should tell Mr. Doyle that the world grain price spike of 2008 is over and prices have returned to more traditional levels. When the fertilizer industry reacts accordingly, farmers will respond with their chequebooks.
– Wayne Black,
Archerwill, Sask.
Healthy eating
I have read Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. The information contained in that book is most convincing.
The grain companies were dismayed with the low-carb craze that developed a few years ago as it affected their bottom line.
As farmers, we should encourage low carb eating as it takes more bushels of grain to produce a pound of protein than it does to produce a pound of carbs.
I have been eating fewer carbohydrates and it shows in my cholesterol count and waistline. These days a low carb diet consists mostly of nutritious vegetables and a healthy amount of protein. It is not the unhealthy lifestyle most would lead you to believe.
If more would follow this way of eating, there would be fewer drugs prescribed for diabetes, cholesterol and a host of other problems.
– Penny Filson,
Woodrow, Sask.
OFA compromise
Re: “Pesticide controls absurd, says OFA,” (WP, April 23.)
A resident of Ottawa, I am an honorary Canadian observer on the Pesticide Working Group in Washington, D.C. It is the position of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture on this issue that is patently absurd. The name of this organization has become a misnomer; the OFA should now be called “Pesticide Industry’s Federation of Agriculture.”
The leadership of OFA doesn’t obviously realize to what extent it has compromised the good will of citizens of Ontario by its blatantly mistaken, partisan position.
Bill 64 has nothing to do with political correctness. How can one possibly connect it to political correctness? Unless, of course, one is blinded by one’s misguided ideology so as to debase and dismiss the ongoing dialogue pertaining to the health risks evident to all informed, thoughtful and vested interest free individuals.
– K. Jean Cottam, PhD,
Nepean, Ont.
