• You will need to login or register before you can post a message. If you already have an Agriville account login by clicking the login icon on the top right corner of the page. If you are a new user you will need to Register.

Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Western Producer Editorial

Collapse
X
Collapse
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    #11
    Farmranger and silverback, Gains leaders might be what's paid in the American market, or what would be paid as an incentive to get Canadian farmers to give up the board so that losses could be recouped. The multinationals must just seeth at having to deal with farmers who have some measure of control over their marketing. This would be why it was so great for them to buy up the pools.

    Grain prices are also higher there because there is higher government payments for grain in export markets allowing grain prices to be higher for domestic. If either of our liberal or conservative governments over the years had what it takes to stand up to American trading practices the ratio of our costs and returns might be different for domestic grains.



    Anyone have any ideas concerning where these companies have stood on the many American attempts to shut the board down?

    craig, have another look at this part of my earlier post, Contrary to your opinion I can see where they are compelling.

    "Craig, I mentioned the impact on domestic feeders a couple of times in earlier posts. It may be argued that there are benefits to a pile of cheap grain for our cows and pigs and chickens, it might also be argued that our domestic users should try to use the market place to get returns which will cover the cost of having their domestic suppliers supply them.

    As a grain grower I understand that my neighbours with livestock aren't getting good enough returns. I also understand that it isn't the grain growers responsibility. If society wants meat in the market let them pay for it, and not just all the processing and packageing and advertising in between. "

    Comment


      #12
      Just curious how many who are posting will contract/deliver barley to the CWB. Talk is cheap but the decision about where to sell barley is really where the rubber hits the road for CWB performance.

      The prices in the open market world June July were $3.50 to $3.75/bu for feed barley and $4.50 to $4.75/bu for 2 row malt (6 row half way in between). I won't put down export targets because the Canadian barley situation is tight and the CWB still cannot compete for domestic supplies. The combined malt barley and feed barley pools are likely to be less than 2 MMT in the coming year when these numbers should be 3 MMT.

      The above are the targets the CWB performance should be judged by for the coming year.

      Comment


        #13
        "...might be what's paid..." pretty good argument tower.

        Maybe the americans are getting more for their grain because that is what it is worth around the rest of the world!

        Dreaming up conspiracies to explain away the lack of competitiveness by the cwb is a pretty sad state of being.

        Please explain how grain companies would be seething at dealing with farmers who have control over their own marketing? Who do you think a grain company would rather deal with, a farmer who is willing to work hard to find the best market for his own grain, or one who could care less and rather let someone in Winnipeg do it for him? Who do you think usually produces the highest quality crops on average? Do you think grain companies would rather deal in high quality grain or poor?

        Are you also saying that they must just hate having to pay US farmers more for their grain and wouldn't it be nice if there was a US wheat board so they could pay less?

        Please explain the value of the cwb in stopping these grain companies from paying us world market prices. It would sure suck to get an extra buck or two a bushel for our wheat this year. It is probably better this way.

        Comment


          #14
          Charlie, well said!!

          I was wondering the same thing. Burbert, Tower, Benny & Agstar, so I would assume you guys aren't even considering the open market for feed, you've already signed your barley up with the CWB for $4.72/bus, less freight??? Give me a break, bunch of windbags!!!! I will bet at least 1/2 of you have priced some barley for fall delivery non board. Why is that??
          Except Burbert because up in Flin Flon they don't buy grain off the combine!!!

          Comment


            #15
            craig said:

            "Your side should be asking for the CWB to handle all feed barley."


            The CWB operates in a dual market now.

            1. Not just a dual market in Western Canada with feed wht/barley bypassing the Board not only into feedlots, but all the grain going through the Export Manufactured Feed Agreement.(EMFA)

            With the EMFA, the companies are allowed to buy feed wht/bly directly from farmers, and bypasss CWB marketing and CWB pooling.

            tower, why doesn't the CWB actually MARKET that feed wht/bly to the big companies on behalf of the farmers?

            The CWB chose not to.


            2. The CWB also operates in a dual market within Canada. If the CWB were truly serious about not being able to operate without a single-desk,, they would be lobbying to add Quebec and Ontario under their single-desk umbrella.

            Has lobbying to add Eastern Canada to the DA ever been presented to a Standing Committee by the CWB, for example?

            And since the CWB itself claims they can only perform well IF they have a single desk, and since they do NOT have a single desk in Canada, one has to conclude that, by their own logic, their present performance is miserably deficient.

            One could argue that compounding interest benefits an investor, so surely the CWB should be arguing that the degradation of profits over time, from lack of a national single desk, has eroded the profits/interest of those Western Canadian farmers held captive in the Designated Area by the CWB's refusal of export licenses.

            What is good for the geesey-gaggle in the West is surely also good for the well-fattened French goose in the East, but needing a good Wheat Board rendering in a single-oven.

            Parsley

            Comment


              #16
              Tower
              Please explain or show us these higher government payments for U.S. export grain. Next explain your loss leader logic. We are to sell our domestic feed barley cheap so that the feedlots will pay us higher prices for what.(Silage,hay, U.S. Corn) Grain Companies must just seeth having to deal with grain farmers who have some measure of control over their grain marketing. In western Canada with grains controlled by the CWB we have no control over our marketing. We have someone else make those decisions who has no economic stake in the transactions. Have you ever seen a CWB marketer get fired for poor performance.Finally just so I understand correctly Tower. Are you telling us that it is the role of the CWB to keep prices low for our domestic feed industry.

              Comment


                #17
                Burbert
                Let me get this straight. It is alright for the greedy CWB to extract premiums from the market place but not alright for farmers to try and make more money on their grain sales. On one hand you accuse farmers of giving our grain away( that's what happens in an open market when the greedy grain companies squeeze us) yet if we try to get better prices we are greedy. Greed implies excess. Not sure where those farmers are but there not in my area. I don't hit homeruns all the time and if money was my total motivation I would have chosen another occupation than farming. In my business I don't have the luxury of giving away my production.

                Comment


                  #18
                  I wonder what subsidies the U.S. farmer is getting right now, as the loan deficiency payment program wouldn’t be paying a dime with world prices at these levels?

                  Tower, I can understand the principle of a “gains leader”, but I really doubt that it would apply in this case. Why would a company take large losses in a large market (U.S. domestic), only to get possible lower future prices in a much smaller market Canadian market? Are these multinationals not only evil, but stupid as well?

                  If another of the CWBs competitors on the world supply side were to want “to shut down the board”, why would that be? If I understand the argument correctly, the CWB gets a premium to the world price. If that’s the case, then the world price of wheat would tend to rise, rather than fall, so why would that be a problem for another seller.
                  If, on the other hand, the CWB is a discount seller, they would tend to drag down prices, and make it harder for other sellers to get more for their wheat when world buyers they know they can get cheap Canadian wheat.
                  I think the discount seller scenario is the most likely reason for any animosity by other sellers toward the CWB. The Algerian “tens of dollars a tonne” durum discount, and Brazil’s Moinho Pacifico purchase of Canadian wheat with an 80 cent per bushel discount from the world price tend to support this view as well.

                  I agree that we have no obligation to provide cheap feed for domestic livestock. Is it possible that domestic feed barley and wheat are being artificially held down by the CWBs monopoly buying power? The evidence is starting to pile up.

                  Comment


                    #19
                    Just a note of interest since we all think we are barley experts. When you post a thread state the percentage of total acres that you crop barley on and whether it is feed or malt. On our farm we over the last 5 years we plant between 20 to 35 % of our acres to barley. This is all 2 row feed.

                    Comment


                      #20
                      Last 5 years averaged about 20% 2 row malt barley. This year I substituted quite a bit of 2 row feed , but the total percentage is about the same. A lot of that 2 row malt was going into animals anyway depending on quality and/or CWB price differentials.

                      Comment

                      • Reply to this Thread
                      • Return to Topic List
                      Working...