Yes, I agree with Mr. Enns.
I'll start with the planning in the fall and explain how that transpired, and then maybe bring that back to a discussion on the basis levels. What happened is that the grain companies started noticing that the crop was going to be very large, and they communicated this with the railway companies through meetings and presentations. It started in the month of September. They notified them that the crop was going to be over 70 million tonnes. The railways responded by saying that they would supply between 5,000 and 5,500 railcars per week each.
The grain companies were selling to a number in that neighbourhood, between 5,000 and 5,500 railcars per week. We need to sell basis rail capacity in a situation like that, so they did. Unfortunately, we didn't get those railcars in the numbers that were promised by the railways. They provided something more in the neighbourhood of between 3,000 and 4,000 railcars per week, actual spots per week. That resulted in contracts with farmers that we couldn't execute on because we were full to the rafters with grain in the country elevator system. It resulted in vessels waiting for product that we couldn't get there, and it resulted ultimately in contract extension penalties and defaults, which is very costly items for the grain industry.
Bringing this back to the basis, the basis has been set these days by grain companies at a level that sends the signal that we don't have room to bring that grain in so please don't sell it to us. The prices are horrible. We still need to bring in grain from months ago that we've contracted with the farmer on for previous sales.
It's not as simple as being able to do a straight subtraction between the export price and current basis levels because companies are barely buying any grain at the existing basis levels. They're bringing in grain at previously contracted prices, and they're trying to hold out street price grain and current deliveries so they can make good on past deliveries. Those are variables that need to get factored in.
In addition to that, as I mentioned, there are the contract—