Wide Corn & Soybean Basis

[MLamirandeRM]

I noticed that corn and soybean basis in Western Canada is extremely wide for near term contracts right now. Does anyone have any thoughts or insight into why this is?

Michelle, Farms.com RM

[farmgal71]

You might want to ask the cattle guys.
I expect this has to do with feed prices.

[errolanderson]

Corn is still too high-priced to be railed into southern Alberta as feed. Feed wheat is less expensive and continues to replace higher-priced barley in rations. That may be part of the reason for the wide corn basis.

Errol

[Hopperbin]

Makes sense there is too much human consumption quality wheat going into the feed markets these days. That said this should help our open market HRSW prices into new crop.

[ajl]

According to the Jan PRO all wheat is feed
wheat. Well except high protein spring
wheat. Have to laugh at the winter wheat
growers who converted expensive N into
high protein feed wheat. Why is there a
land boom on?

[forage]

I really don't think most landowners really realize just how this practice may damage every damn aquifer we have in Alberta and just are we going to have water for our own personal use let alone for livestock. Wake up ranchers and speak up. At least some organizations are not afraid to speak up and I appreciate the efforts ASRG is doing. As I am working for one of the majors I would be punted out door if they knew I was even posting on this site. But I know damn well in a couple years when I have my place paid for I won't have to silenced . So those of you who don't have a ball and chain arround their neck stand up for your rights to have safe and reliable water scourcs.

[ASRG]

The language in our post is pretty strong. When we say ban, perhaps moratorium would be a better word?
Can hydro fracking be done safely? We really don't know because there just isn't enough scientific study done on this practice? Going by what's happened in Pennsylvania and Wyoming....it doesn't look very promising!
That is what we are asking for.......get it right before you do it....and if the science says it can't be done safely....then don't do it? I don't think that is too much to ask? After all it is our land, water, and health at stake.......not some fat cat sitting in an office in Calgary or Dallas?
What is scary is we have this completely incompetent regulator (ERCB) licensing everything that passes over their desk, without any kind of knowledge?
At a Synergy meeting at Eagle Hill(west of Olds) I asked a senior ERCB official this question:
"What happens to an old abandoned well drilled 60 years ago, with a weak and decaying cement plug, when you crank up the pressure during a hydro frack? What stops it from blowing that old well out?" (this is an area with a lot of high content H2S wells).
His answer " We would never hydro frack near an old well. We know exactly how far the frack will crack the formation"......yea, right!!!
At that time the facilitator grabbed the mike away from me.......before I could ask if they had any kind of a clue where all those old wells were! Like the ones that started leaking in the schoolyard at Calmar!
Instead she handed it to this old boy who wondered if the companies sponsoring the event were going to have any more baseball caps, as he got there late and they were all gone! That seemed to be the most popular topic of the night!

[grassfarmer]

An immediate moratorium may be a better request
and one that would not be out of line with the rest
of the worlds thinking? It seems no one is as
hung-ho on this as AB and BC. I understand the
Americans are rather leery of it, Quebec has an
outright ban on it, the UK has a moratorium on it
after their unusual "mini earthquake" event and
the French have a ban on it after seeing the UK
experience. Here its a case of "bring it on, the
bigger the better, to hell with the consequences."

[ASRG]

Unfortunately Alberta is a petro state. Big oil owns the government.
If you ever get a chance to hear Andrew Nikiforuk talk about how a petro state operates, it isn't hard to see the attitude within the government.
Bulgaria BANNED hydro fracking last week.....Bulgaria gets it better than our geniuses in Edmonton!

[forage]

Grassfarmer ,ASRG on your website you posted a letter to 4 Ministers on a moratorium on fracing , I bet a dollar to a donut that it wasn't well received and have you received any response or are they all to busy on the campaign trail.