If you were looking for a good interest rate on your farm machinery purchase in October 1981, you could take advantage of this offer at 16 per cent or less. That was a better deal than through FCC — our front-page story in the Oct. 15 issue reported that its rate increase to 16.75 per cent had been greeted with outcries across the country. However, a Manitoba FCC spokesman said the increase was meaningless because the organization’s coffers in the province were virtually empty anyway.
The Crow rate issue was still bubbling away that month — Transport Minister Jean-Luc Pepin had expressed his “personal opinion” that it should change, while Wheat Board Minister Hazen Argue expressed his “personal opinion” that it should not.
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Also differing were opinions on car allocation for rapeseed, and whether grain companies should receive cars based on their export sales or receipts in the country.
That week we reported that the USDA was estimating a record world grain crop, but that was not due to production in the Soviet Union. Its harvest was forecast at a dismal 170 million tonnes, nine million below the previous year. Our editor correctly speculated the Soviets would soon be in the market for large amounts.
After what was apparently a mutual understanding between Canadian and New Zealand producers, Agriculture Minister Eugene Whelan had announced that imports of New Zealand lamb would be suspended until Easter, 1982 in order not to disrupt the Canadian market.
