Focus on Sabbatical Leader Responds to Criticism

I thought that I should respond to the “Cold Water Dousing” editorial in the last Prairie Grains, of which Focus on Sabbatical was the only named recipient. Being the “freshman” of farm organizations, one expects a certain amount of criticism from the “seniors” — but in the future, we hope that they will do us and their readership the courtesy of attending one of our meetings before penning criticisms.

Our proposal was described as a “scheme pitched recently by a few farmers.”  That would seem to be a bit misleading, once you find out that the producers pushing for this program to date farm more than 10 million acres. So far we have run very successful meetings in Canada, the U.S., Australia and Brazil.

When you hear of a meeting in your area next winter, I would strongly encourage you to attend and see what has caused other farmers small and large (200 to 100,000 acre farmers) to believe that an organized, periodic cut of 8 billion bushels can put a fair prices back into the bushels they produce.

 -- Todd Goudy , Focus on Sabbatical, Fargo, N.D.

Editor’s note: We contacted Dr. Won Koo, ag economist at North Dakota State University, for his opinion about this group’s effort to organize farmers around the world to cut grain production and thus raise market prices. Koo’s assessment affirms key points made in the April Prairie Grains editorial about the Focus on Sabbatical effort. Koo points out that World Trade Organization member countries dependent upon grain imports, such as Japan and Korea, would likely protest such a movement as trade distorting, responding perhaps by increasing domestic production or reacting with other trade measures. Koo says that the effort would also be thwarted by non-participating grain producers who may increase their production, offsetting the reduction in supply committed by Focus on Sabbatical participants.  Nevertheless, Goudy says that other ag economists and farm leaders are supportive of his group’s effort.  More information about the initiative can be found on the Internet: www.focusonsabbatical.com.