Madam Speaker, there is a great deal of frustration with the farmers that I represent. I should comment that I am a farmer myself and I do understand some of these issues. I have been very involved in the transportation debates that have gone on.
I have forgotten now how many different times we have analyzed the transportation system in western Canada. My farmers are very frustrated when they have bins full of grain, in fact, bins full of tough and damp grain from last year that have not moved.
Is that a fault of the producer? Is it the producer's fault that we did not sell last year's crop? That is the backup that we have. We have an archaic system that is trying to hold commodities from one year to the next. The system is trying to speculate on whether or not this is a good time to sell, when in fact, the Canadian Wheat Board's mandate is to market grain, not speculate on grain.
Many of my producers have asked me why we need a Grain Commission? I commented on this earlier. We have an arbitrary grading system that would probably fit in the 1930s. It does not fit the mode today.
We have about 40 or 50 different grades of grain that mean absolutely nothing to the consumer in another part of the world. Perhaps it is time that we looked at a system that actually asks the consumers or the customers in the country where we are going to market the grain, what do they want? What traits in that grain does the customer want in milling qualities, malting qualities, or oil content for the oilseeds? Perhaps it is time we had a serious look at this whole system.
We can change our research and development to provide varieties that will provide exactly what the consumer wants, instead of being tied to an old system that classifies it as a number one, a number two or a number three. That means nothing when it is turned into a loaf of bread. It means nothing when it is turned into a malt barley that is made into beer.