To the Editor:
As the Senate scrutinizes legislation that will make changes to the Canadian Wheat Board, politicians need to remember that agriculture is not a political game. To ensure a smooth transition and a new future for western wheat and barley farmers and agri-industry, swift passage of Bill C-18 is needed in the Senate.
As a farmer, I support the government's Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act because even though some years the CWB has made me money and some years it hasn't, at the end of the day, farmers who want to market their own wheat and barley need to have the freedom to do so - as they do in all other parts of Canada.
Three generations of my family have worked towards the right to market our own wheat and barley. My father, brother and I all farm near Fort Macleod, Alberta: we believe changes to the Canadian Wheat Board have been a long time coming. Many of our friends and neighbours would say it has been too long coming - especially those friends that were sent to jail for protesting the monopoly.
Any Canadian business expects to be able to choose where they do business and to whom they can sell their product. And as a business person, I must find the best price for my product - wheat and barley. Within a democratic nation such as our own, this is a given. However, this has NOT been the case for wheat and barley farmers in western Canada. Because I live in the west, I am NOT allowed to choose where I sell my wheat, I MUST sell it to the Canadian Wheat Board and that has been the law for over six decades.
Back in the days when many farm homes did not even have a phone, farmers pooling their grain within the Wheat Board had a marketing advantage, but we don't live in that world anymore. Since the CWB's inception, many things have changed and continue to evolve. And what arguably may have worked six decades ago, is not necessarily what works today or what we need for tomorrow's competitive global market.
Today, progresses in technology and science have changed how I farm and also how I market my grain. I now use a GPS on my tractor to save on input costs related to fertilizer and seed and also to help me farm in a more environmentally sustainable way with less tillage. So using today's technology to market my wheat and barley makes sense to me. I already use my blackberry from the seat of my tractor, locking in prices for non-Board grains like canola, peas, lentils, oats and flax.
And a recent George Morris Study, The Move to a Voluntary Canadian Wheat Board: What Should be Expected, emphasizes new opportunities for wheat and barley in western Canada, showing the reality of what I am already experiencing on my farm with the other non-Board crops.
As a farmer and small business person, allowing more companies the opportunity to purchase my grain is a good thing. This will mean more competition for my product. And not just for exports, where the vast majority of Canadian wheat now goes. There will now be more viable value added opportunities, like the Alliance pasta plant being built in Saskatchewan. This is the first major pasta plant built on the prairies in decades, actually, in my own lifetime. When the legislation finally passes, I will be able to sell directly to the plant.
For those that want to keep using the Board, they will have that option. With its respected world-wide brand, a huge rolodex of sales contacts, experienced people in rail and ocean freight, front line staff who work with farmers every day and now with the borrowing ability the federal government has guaranteed for five years, the CWB should not fear competition in the free market.
Innovation will go hand in glove with new opportunities.
Soon, farmers will have no road blocks to invest in their own wheat and barley value added projects. I will have the chance to branch into different kinds of wheat and barley specialty markets, focussing on the highest quality product for the highest return, rather than be limited to taking average prices, the way my father and my grandfather were forced to do in the past.
Like it or not, a new day is coming for western Canadian wheat and barley farmers. And as a young farmer, I am personally looking forward to next year when I will have the freedom to choose where I sell my first load of wheat.
Stephen Vandervalk, Fort Macleod, AB.
