A group of Manitoba and Saskatchewan farmers wants the Canadian Wheat Board and its single-desk marketing system reinstated.
Organizers of a meeting Feb. 10 in Swan River say 50 farmers attended and unanimously passed a resolution calling for a return to orderly marketing and co-ordinated grain transportation logistics.
The resolution says loss of the board has resulted in an increasingly dysfunctional rail system with no grain logistics oversight, lost transportation efficiency, reduced grain quality guarantees to customers and an overall loss of $6.5 billion to farmers’ income over two years. It also cites a loss of jobs across Canada due to the demise of the board.
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“The fact a farm meeting of this size could unanimously pass this resolution is a strong indication to Ottawa that farmers are now feeling the loss of the CWB in their pocketbooks,” Kyle Korneychuk, spokesperson for the Canadian Wheat Board Alliance said in a release.
Manitoba Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development Ron Kostyshyn spoke at the meeting, along with Swan River grain farmer Ken Sigurdson, and Korneychuk, who was formerly a farmer-elected director of the CWB.
The CWB lost its monopoly Aug. 1, 2012. Its remaining assets were transferred to G3, a consortium of Bunge and an investment company owned by the Saudi government in 2014.
