Regarding letter by Bernie Sambrook (Open Forum April 1). Unfortunately for Mr. Sambrook his theatrics only underscore just how out of step his views are from reality.
Sambrook has, for some time, advanced the need to maintain the economic qualities of individuality, deregulation, competition and a free market within the farm community. Yet the world’s economic movers and shakers are clearly abandoning those qualities in droves.
Farm newspapers, on a weekly basis, report the never-ending mergers in the agri-business world. Their aim, of course, is to gain an economic advantage by enhancing their bargaining position, primarily at the expense of farmers.
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In fact concentration is so great in some grain and meat processing businesses in the U.S. that Washington is publicly feeling uneasy.
Among the economic groups to see the folly in the approach endorsed by Sambrook is the richest sector of Petroleum Exporting countries. Collectively they recently agreed to supply management by cutting oil output by 1.7 million barrels a day.
As a result world oil prices in two months have shot up from a low of $10.67 to almost $17 a barrel, according to market watchers.
Rather than monotonously lecturing Canadian farmers on the evils of monopolies and collective action, Mr. Sambrook should turn his efforts to enlightening the Arab sheiks with his economic wisdom. In appreciation the sheiks may reward him with a drive in a Porsche off a high cliff.
– Peter Galawan,
Virden, Man.
