(Resource News International) — Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz wants a “clear roadmap” from the Canadian Wheat Board
on how to provide greater marketing choice for Prairie barley producers, he said in a teleconference
Tuesday.
Ritz made his comments following a closed-door meeting
with CWB officials and industry and farmer
representatives in Ottawa.
While a group of farmers in favour of keeping the CWB as the
single-desk marketer of western Canadian barley was kept out of
the meeting, Ritz said everyone who was at the table wanted
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Those in attendance, which included
people from across the value chain — barley processors, malting
companies, commercial grain handlers, and farmers — agreed that
there was a gap between what western barley producers are asking
for and what they’re currently getting from the CWB, Ritz said, and the
differences were on how best to close that gap.
“What we came away with by the end of the meeting was an
agreement to deliver a strong mandate to the Canadian Wheat
Board — a mandate to outline a clear roadmap on how to deliver
marketing freedom to western Canadian growers,” said Ritz.
The CWB’s recently announced CashPlus program, which offers barley growers a cash price option, was not the answer Ritz was looking for, he said.
The CWB’s board of directors meets in Winnipeg for a strategic planning session later this
week, and Ritz said he expected to see that roadmap shortly afterward.
Ritz said he would like the CWB to “be a part of the
solution,” but added that the government will go forward itself
in removing the single desk if the CWB doesn’t come back with an
acceptable plan.
Legislation coming
Ritz said he hoped legislation to remove the single barley desk could be tabled before
Parliament takes a break in three weeks. However, he noted that
many factors outside of his control, such as the possibility of
an early election, could delay any legislation.
The Conservatives
the support of at least one opposition party to pass any
legislation. Among the opposition parties, the Liberals and NDP both back the CWB’s single desk and the Bloc Quebecois has previously said the Tories’ action on the CWB file “leads us to
fear the worst for supply management” even though the Tories have publicly backed supply management in Canada’s dairy, poultry and egg sectors.
Last summer the government’s attempts to do away with the
CWB’s single desk through regulation, rather than by a vote in Parliament, were halted by the courts. A Federal Court appeal is set for late February, and Ritz was questioned if the government was
trying to circumvent the legal process.
The government, he said, was considering every option available, as the window to create
an open market in time for the new crop year is getting smaller.
CWB CEO Greg Arason said in a release before Ritz’s meeting that he and the other board representatives who attended will “take what we hear back to the board table.”
In the CWB’s release, Arason noted that the CashPlus program has the support of the board of directors because it retains single-desk premiums while giving farmers more choice as to when and how they price their malting barley. It also conforms to existing legislation, he said.
“CashPlus was developed specifically to deal with issues that arose from the kind of uncertainty that the industry faced in the spring and summer of 2007,” Arason said. “Barley producers with whom we’ve talked have generally expressed interest and would like to be given the chance to use this program.”
The CWB’s chief operating officer Ward Wiesensel and government relations director Avis Gray also attended the Ottawa meeting.
Pro-single desk groups that weren’t invited to Tuesday’s meeting included the National Farmers Union and Friends of the CWB.
At a separate press conference Tuesday morning in Ottawa, Ken Sigurdson, a Manitoba farmer from the “Save My CWB Campaign,” said Ritz “has set up today’s meeting in Ottawa to give grain and malting companies an opportunity to browbeat the CWB into eliminating its jurisdiction over barley marketing.”
Sigurdson, who farms at Swan River, Man., called Ritz’s meeting a “counterfeit of democracy.”
Manitoba’s agriculture minister, Rosann Wowchuk, said in a release Tuesday that the government was again employing “closed-door tactics” to try to dismantle the single desk.
“The CWB doesn’t belong to politicians in Ottawa,” she said. “It belongs to Prairie producers and, to date, the federal government has been given no clear mandate to take away single-desk marketing.”
Wowchuk’s stance puts her at odds with her counterparts in Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia, who on Monday issued a joint release backing Ritz’s plans.
She noted that the Manitoba government in late 2006 conducted a vote among farmers in that province, showing 62 and 69.5 per cent support for the single desk on Prairie barley and wheat, respectively.
(With files by FBC staff.)
