Bill C-300 -- The Gutting Of The Canadian Wheat Board

We caught up with some farmers near Perdue, just west of Saskatoon, transferring some of this year's harvest from trucks into grain bins, to see what they were thinking. To set up our debate on the future of the Wheat Board we were joined by Barry Wilson. He's the national correspondent with The Western Producer - a weekly agriculture newspaper. He was in our Ottawa studio. Wheat Board – Government Well, even if large numbers of Canadian grain farmers are happy with the status quo---the federal government has hinted that the Wheat Board will eventually have to learn to swim with the sharks in an open market. David Anderson is the Conservatives' Parliamentary Secretary for Agriculture and the Canadian Wheat Board, and we reached him in Medicine Hat, Alberta. Wheat Board – Farmer Now that the harvest is wrapping up, the people who grow our grain have more time to speak out against the proposed end to the Wheat Board monopoly. The concerned farmer is Noreen Johns. She raises grain near Zelma, Saskatchewan about a half-hour drive southeast of Saskatoon. http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/2006/200609/20060913.html Commentary: It seems to me that the majority of farmers are actually in favour of keeping the CWB, especially the smaller farmers. But I like to think that, in this land of free enterprise, and with this government especially, committed to the marketplace, that Canada's farmers are up to the challenge. Canada's farmers, irregardless of the formation of the CWB in the first place, and despite (collectively) their investment of billions of dollars in land, equipment, expertise, would surely welcome the fresh air of competition, even if it brought some uncertainties to the marketplace. Heck, next thing you know, the 20-year patent law (implemented by past-PM Brian Mulroney) that applies to the pharmaceutical industry will be in the Conservatives' sights. Giving Big Pharma a virtual monopoly in the marketplace through patent law will soon be demonstrated by the gutting of the CWB to be unnecessary, and that Big Pharma doesn't in fact need that kind of protection in order to recoup their billions spent in R&D, and to compete in the marketplace. After all, Canada's farmers will apparently don't need protection. They will in fact learn to love "to swim with the sharks". So why shouldn't Big Pharma? [Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on September 14, 2006]

Note: http://www.cbc.ca/thecu...