Archive for December, 2006

This column marks the third in my series of Wheat Board-related articles. Today, I want to deal with some odds and ends of Wheat Board news.

This last week, the Federal Accountability Act was passed by the Senate. The Conservative government had introduced this legislation in response to the sponsorship scandal. The Accountability Act contains a provision which finally includes the Canadian Wheat Board under the Access to Information Act. This now allows the public to find out if the CWB is spending farmers’ money wisely. Commercially sensitive information is not included in this provision, however. Having personally been told by Wheat Board auditors about massive waste in the Canadian Wheat Board, I personally look forward to accountability finally coming to the CWB.

A few constituents have asked about changes to the Wheat Board’s voters list. About 16,000 names were dropped from the voters list. Producers were dropped if they had not delivered any Wheat Board grains in the last two years.

Names dropped off the voters list included those individuals who had left farming, shifted their operations away from traditional grain crops or had passed away. Some of the producers whose names were dropped had not delivered grain in over 10 years. For those producers who wanted their names added to the voters list because they still felt they were involved in farming, their names were added to the list. Approximately 1,600 people chose this option.

In closing, it is very important for farmers to vote on the barley plebiscite. Many farmers find it very offensive that other people are allowed to dictate how they sell their barley–and they have a valid point. But, I know that some farmers who want change to come to the Wheat Board often don’t want to vote on Wheat Board matters. However, we are giving barley growers a chance to make some real changes. Farmers need to get involved and let their voices be heard on this important issue.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours.

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament, and I welcome your feedback. Write or call my offices.

This is my second article in regards to the Canadian Wheat Board. In my first article, I talked about the history of the Wheat Board, and how it developed. This article will deal with some of the peripheral issues that surround the Wheat Board. Issues that while important, are not central to its existence.

One of the frustrations that have been expressed for many years about the Wheat Board is the Wheat Board’s continued support for the current grain grading system, Kernel Visual Distinction (KVD). KVD is the system that grades wheat #1 red, #2 red etc. It does this basically on visual characteristics of the grain.

This can cause major problems. First, there are underlying causes for changes in wheat color. Not all the changes mean that the milling characteristics of the wheat have changed. An example of this is a frost in the early 1990s that affected durum in the south of the province.

The KVD Wheat Board system graded all the durum as feed. After buying the grain cheaply, the grain companies sold the grain for milling at a massive profit. If the so-called “black box grading” system had been used, farmers would have received much higher prices for their durum. They would have been paid for the protein and other milling characteristics of the grain. (No wonder the grain companies and millers like the current system).

The current KVD system costs farmers in western Canada about $200 million/year, according to Canadian Seed Trade Association second vice-president Jeff Reid (testifying before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food in Ottawa on Oct. 3rd). And this does not include losses due to missed opportunity–because new higher yielding grain varieties are not being produced on the prairies.

All in all, it makes one wonder who does the Wheat Board represent, farmers or the millers and grain companies.

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament, and I welcome your feedback. Write or call my offices.

With the Wheat Board elections over and the barley plebiscite coming up, I’ve decided to do a series of Wheat Board related columns over the next few weeks. Some of the columns will be very opinionated and others (like this first one) will be more of a historical nature, introducing the background of various elements of the Board.

If you are like me and have lived on the Prairies all of your life, you will have heard the Wheat Board debated endlessly. You may wonder when and how the Wheat Board started.

While the question may be simple, the answer is fairly complex because there are different starting points for different Wheat Boards in the history of western Canada.

The first Wheat Board was imposed on western farmers during World War I, to keep grain prices down. The government felt it needed cheap grain for the war effort and wanted to control the wheat market. In 1920, this Wheat Board came to an end because wheat prices had started to fall.

Through the 1920s, the pooling of grain became very popular, leading to the formation of the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool among other happenings. While a few farmers demanded compulsory pooling, the Wheat Pool and other farm groups opposed the idea, preferring instead a voluntary share of the market.

In 1935, the Wheat Board was again established, but its main feature was a price floor for wheat. Through 1936-1937, this floor was so low that farmers sold all their wheat on the open market.

The Wheat Board as we know it today really got going in 1943, when the government (again concerned about high wheat prices) imposed a monopoly for wheat and other grains. The basic features were the same as we know, with price pooling, initial payments etc. The major difference between this board and the one during World War I is that this board has never been disbanded.

(Source of the above material: The Story of A Province by John Archer and A.M. Derby.)

I’m Brad Trost, your Member of Parliament, and I welcome your feedback. Write or call my offices.