Wheat Board Doomed Without Monopoly: CEO
(March 12, 2004 - CanWest News) The Canadian Wheat Board
might as well shut down if Alberta passes legislation aimed at breaking
the board's monopoly, said Adrian Measner, the board's president and CEO.
"It would have a major impact," Measner said Thursday of the
private member's bill before the Alberta legislature.
Alberta Premier Ralph Klein replied that Measner's admission that the
wheat board would collapse in the face of any competition shows how little
value it has.
"If he thinks Alberta going to a dual supply system would speed
the end of the Canadian Wheat Board, what does that tell you?" he
asked reporters.
Calgary MLA Mark Hlady's bill would create a 10-year test program that
would allow Alberta farmers to opt out of marketing their crops through
the board.
Measner told the federal agriculture committee the fact that the bill
even made it to the legislature is "discouraging" adding that
the board's entire national marketing strategy for exports would be
undermined if its monopoly were broken. "The single desk can't
be effective if you're going to be competing against other sellers.
The goal here is to get the highest possible price for the product you're
marketing and do the branding that we're doing.
"If you're going to be competing against somebody else, the
customer is always going to buy from the lowest seller, not the highest,
and it would erode those market premiums (that the CWB can demand)."
Measner said the price of Canada's wheat exports would quickly fall as
opportunistic buyers would begin playing sellers off against one another,
which is the system that exists in the United States.
"We would see if have a major, major impact on our ability to be
effective," Measner said. "It would take that away
totally."
"If it's a multiple seller environment. I don't see a lot of
value that this organization could add. We don't own
facilities. We don't have the same infrastructure that other (major
multinational) companies have. So if the buyers are simply
purchasing from the sellers that sell the lowest price, I'm not sure what
value we can add in that environment."
Agriculture Minister Shirley McClellan said Measner was making
Alberta's case for it.
"If they are as good as they say they are, it should be no
problem," she declared.
Klein emphasized he doesn't oppose the Canadian Wheat Board, but said
he believes in choice.
He spoke favourably of Hlady's bill, but said he didn't know whether it
would be passed.
The premier predicted a Supreme Court challenge from the federal
government if Alberta does not pass the legislation and put it in
practice.
Hlady said, "If they (the wheat board) can't compete with an open
market after 57 years in business, then you know there's something
wrong."
Measner said the Alberta farmers through their two representatives on
the CWB board voted in favour of the single-desk approach.
"Their farmers have spoken. Now they may not like the way
their farmers are speaking, but they have spoken, I think they need to
respect the democratic process, the same way we would respect that they
are democratically elected."
Hlady dismissed that claim, saying everyone knows that only farmers who
support the Canadian Wheat Board vote for the representatives.
James Baxter and Tom Barrett
CanWest News Service
Ottawa |
