(Oct. 7, 2011) The Grain Growers of Canada, a group which claims to represent more farmers than there are in all of western Canada, is fond of claiming that without the Canadian Wheat Board value adding of grains will increase. It is also a favourite of our Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz.
Aside from the obvious question of why farmers should take less for their grain to subsidize processors, what does the fact that a major Canadian company, Legumex Walker Inc. is spending $110 million US on a canola crushing plant to be located in Washington State, USA, do to this contention?
After all, the CWB has nothing to do with canola, so why is a Canadian company running to the US to build a processing plant when there is so much Canadian-grown canola?
Obviously transportation costs in relation to major markets play a larger role in value adding than the simple-minded idea of ‘Wheat Board bad for processing’ so beloved by the Grain Growers of Canada and others.